Have come here in desperation and in need of advice. Please help me :(

    • Have come here in desperation and in need of advice. Please help me :(

      Hey everyone,

      If anyone's reading this I am eternally grateful.

      I have been feeling kind of empty and lost on what to do with my life for some time now. Firstly I would just like to say that I'm not looking for any bitchy comments back, saying i'm lazy or need to sort it out or anything, I just need honest but understanding advice, as I'm in a sensitive place at the moment.

      (I'm not saying any of you would be that heartless but I'm very new to forums so I don't know that it's like really).

      Anyway. I am female and nearly 18 years old. After secondary school I stayed on at my school's sixth form to do my A levels. Everything went great for the first few months, surprisingly I really seemed to click with the work and I was getting near to As in my subjects. (I was studying Art, Drama and English). I loved art, got As on my essays in English and was chosen for the main part in my classes Drama production, where I was praised by my teachers and classmates for my performance.
      Around this time at sixth form though I was feeling extremely low and under pressure. I felt self conscious all the time and at times didn't have much motivation for my work, I did in the first few months, but as time went on I became more and more unhappy. There is one major thing which I feel needs to be mentioned. A week before I started sixth form I had found out that my then boyfriend of 6 months cheated on me whilst I was on holiday in Ibiza that summer. I had an extremely close knit group of friends at that time and me and my ex were part of the same friendship group. The girl he cheated on me with was his "best friend" - someone in our friendship group who I thought I was friends with, and who I had been suspicious of for quite a while in our relationship. Well I was proved right after I came back from my holiday and I was shattered, I felt completely humiliated and unloved. The worst thing is, after I came back off holiday things were fine between us and he came round my house the day I saw him. We slept together that night and I felt so loved up. However, after it happened he went extremely funny and ended up walking out. I was left in pieces as I had no idea what was going on, and was furious that he had just used me and slept with me. I called one of my close friends in tears (also a friend of his) and he was furious. That night after being called a c**t by my friends for not telling me what was going on, he owned up and said he had made out with that girl whilst I was on holiday.
      I know stuff like that happens all the time, and I don't want sympathy for it. I am completely over it now and have a new boyfriend who I am a million times closer to than my ex, he is like my best friend as well as boyfriend, and he never fails to prove to me that he loves me just the way I am.
      One of the reasons I was so shattered after what happened with my ex was due to many deep rooted problems. I have always been quite a self conscious, paranoid person due to the men in my family. My Dad left when I was four and has never seemed to care about me or my sister. The one time he did come round, we later found out, was so he could take us out and wouldn't have to keep paying maintenance money. When I was younger my Grandad - Mum's Dad - was like a father to me. We were inseparable and many of my happy childhood memories involve him. However, he died when I was seven years old. Therefore I have always been insecure about boyfriends, sometimes suspicious of them leaving or cheating on me, so as you can imagine when this happened with my ex I was shattered. I felt worthless and like all my paranoia was right and that I didn't deserve to be loved.
      About two years ago now, just before I began sixth form, my Mum suffered from severe depression and was taken away from us for a few months to be sectioned. During this time I saw a different side to my Mum and we had horrible arguments constantly. I then felt like I didn't even know who my own Mum was anymore, and it felt like my family were falling to pieces.
      Anyway, my ex and the girl he cheated on me with were in the year above me in sixth form. It was hard to handle but at the time I handled it well, but a few months into the new year I decided to leave sixth form. I felt depressed every night when I would come home, I would cry every evening and I felt self conscious, ugly, unloved and wasn't sure of who my friends were anymore. I wanted a fresh start and decided I would start my A levels again that September at college. A lot of my teachers didn't want to see me go and a lot of them tried to persuade me to stay, saying I would get As if I stayed. I just felt like I wanted to break free, and I was convinced a fresh start would make my pain go away.
      So last September I started College. The college I went too was far away and I had to get the bus at half 6 every morning and got home around 6 o clock. I had tons of work to do every evening but all I wanted to do was sleep, I was so tired. My new boyfriend was with me at this time and he supported me all the way, but he agreed when I would moan about the long days and how poor the quality of work was that I was given. After a while I couldn't lie to myself, I wasn't happy there either. I wanted to do well, but I felt so empty and uninspired. I had no motivation and would often feel self conscious and depressed, especially as the College was full of new people.
      Now I'm waiting to start a Graphic Design course in May, and I'm supposed to be doing a couple of evening classes in September to get some a levels.
      However, this could take up to two years and being almost 18, I'm just unhappy that I could be 23/24 by the time I finish university if I do go.
      I just feel like such a failure. Every day I wake up and feel worthless, I think of things I could do but I have no enthusiasm for the things I love anymore. I WANT to have enthusiasm, but I just don't. I just feel like I have wasted so much time. Don't get me wrong, I am not saying that I hate myself and I hate life. I am very ambitious and have so many things I want to do and see. I'm a caring, genuine person but I think I have so many insecurities that I have wedged deep inside and don't know how to handle them. Everything with my ex, my mum's depression, my dad, grandad, all seem to have left emotional scars and now I don't feel like I know who I am or what I want anymore. The only thing that I'm sure of is that I love my boyfriend and I feel so lucky to have him, but then I don't want to be depressed because I know he fell in love with my bubbly, inspiring side, not an insecure, depressed loser :(.
      I just know I have a lot to give but I feel like I have made all the wrong choices, and I don't know what the best option would be now.
      Every day I dream of having a happy life, doing the things I love, photography, art, drawing, etc. But I have no money and just feel worthless.
      I want to get a job but i'm so scared of failure and I don't feel like i have the confidence around people anymore.
      I hate feeling like this, I used to be a strong, confident, ambitious person with everything to live for, now I just feel like my insecurities and past are eating away at me and I don't know how to get them to leave me alone. I WANT to, but I don't know how to get over this. I've always been good at handling things on my own (or have i?) but I don't feel I can handle this on my own anymore :(.
      :confused::(
    • Re: Have come here in desperation and in need of advice. Please help me :(

      I'm sure you've heard what doesn't kill you makes you stronger, right? As cheesy as it sounds it really does have some truth to it. Except you only become stronger when you learn something, and move on. For example, it seems that the whole boyfriend crisis and insecurity with men and self conscious behavior is all related to things in the past, you have to learn to let go of all your hardships and just plainly move on. Stop saying no to things or thinking negatively because your scared, and just be spontaneous. Stop questioning things or asking if you'll just crash and burn, just go straight for whatever you want without caring what anyone or even what you will think. You're only 18, and in my opinion you'll never figure out who you really are until you've lived a full life, so don't worry about that. Instead of focusing on what will become of you, try and focus on what will become of life. Like, do things in relation to the events that will happen, instead of focusing so much on how your life will be impacted by them. This is sort of a short term answer, I could give you a ton more advice but it'd be easier if we spoke more 1 on 1 and took things one step at a time, so if you'd like me to give you more advice just send me a message, and I'll fer sure help you out. n_n
    • Re: Have come here in desperation and in need of advice. Please help me :(

      Life is full of nothing but problems thats for sure. Especially the people! The people in this world are full of anger, pride, selfishness, hate, and so on. Just based on experiences in my life I don't blame you for having certain issues. People these days only really care about themselves and aren't reliable for anything. Rarely do you meet people that genuinely care about other people. Rarely do you meet a person you can completely trust without any doubts in your mind. Personally thats why I place all of my faith in Jesus Christ who is always reliable. God is there for you on both your brightest and darkest days unlike people like your ex boyfriend.

      I find that instead of putting your focus on what you don't have and putting it on what you could have, you will lose all of that fear inside. Instead of looking at yourself as worthless you could look at all of the wonderful things that you could do with your life not only for yourself, but for others. Sometimes all a person needs is a change of perspective or a different point of view to leave all of their issues in the the rear view mirror. Sometimes when everyones lives around you are crumbling one person has to be the pillar that keeps the ceiling from collapsing. Now the question is...are you going to be that pillar?

      Are you going to be the positive, strong woman that you can be or continue to live in fear and depression? It's really up to you. Don't waste a minute more of your life worrying about what could go wrong in your life. Start focusing on what could go right in your life if your brave enough to attempt to reach your goals. Heck maybe along the way you'll realize that your goals aren't what was meant for you in the first place. I use to want certain things for my life as well but it's only when I realized that my purpose in life was to help others to reach THEIR goals that I really started to become a success myself.

      Don't give up the fight before it's started. Don't quit the race on just the first lap. If things don't work out like you planned at least you can say that you gave it your best shot. Then you wont have to ask yourself what might have been.

      Remember the bible says that God is LOOKING for people to be good to. If you can't do something on your own, he's more than happy to help.

      God Bless!