Community Check-In: How is everyone doing?
Given the current cosmic circumstances – hurricanes, extreme weather, end of the year festivities, moon 2: intergalactic boogaloo, and the never-ending struggle against the forces of evil – it seems like a good time to delve into each others personal realms just a a bit, or perhaps too much.
So... How's it going? How's life? Working on anything? How's the family? How's your friends and loved ones? Any worries? Any triumphs, failures, or any other radical (or not so radical) sensical nonsense? Writing or constructing your magnum opus? or are you just feeling like a massive dope, or even The Massive Dopeness?
Rant, don't rant, just a check-in, choose-your-own-adventure, go to page 85, or go to page 20, your choice.
We already have several recurring threads that scratch the surface of our present experiences, focusing primarily on tech and games and the like2. But, hows your individual journey going?1
Footnotes
1. If this were 2014a I would have thrown a yolo in there, but it's 2024 so it belongs in the footnotes to signify the cognizant cringe of it all.1a. If this were pre-2012 I would have thrown an "inb4" in there, but its 2024 so I've added it to a sub-footnote, and made it smaller hoping most people stopped reading before now
2. We have this recurring mental health thread, but I feel its a bit too targeted (more of a downage than a positive start of a conversation) and sort of dicey to talk about for most people in our public forum, especially on the permanent and entirely ephemeral superhighway of information.
Putting a fair amount of time into volunteering for the Harris campaign.
I don't think I have ever been quite this invested in the outcome of an election. In 2016 there was still some uncertainty about what a Trump administration would look like. There is no longer any doubt.
The current Republican platform scares the shit out of my friends and me. We made flyers and have been posting them when and where we can, connecting them to Project 2025. We all also did the Postcards to Swing States campaign.
Thank you for volunteering!
What have you been doing in that volunteering? I’ve been thinking about it, but I live in California so there no local GOTV effort. And considering how I never respond to text banking, I imagine many others don’t too, so I feel like that’s not something I’d want to do if so.
I just finished a set of get out the vote postcards.
Next week I will be knocking on doors in a swing state.
From California, the Democrats organize trips to Nevada to get out the vote.
Cool, I will look into it.
Thank you for volunteering!
Lost my job on Monday! Position was eliminated because 30% of our sales dried up when our biggest customer pulled our product. Not feeling comfortable right now.
That sounds tough. The best of luck in finding something new!
Deeply exhausted. Partner has been fighting a nasty UTI for a couple of months now, and I'm not sleeping well. My anxiety got cranked up with the hurricanes. I'm not near them, I think it's just a function of being cranked in general due to election stuff. Houses are expensive, but so is everyone being too tired to cook.
Managed to keep my partner out of the ER last night by some lucky catheter management.
Ugh, UTI’s are the worst. I found kidney stones easier to deal with, at least they didn’t make me scared to drink water. I hope your partner feels better soon.
Hit the ER again tonight. Probably more antibiotics next week
😩
I had complications from a UTI years ago, and every once in a while, I still feel a sting when I’m stressed about it. Pelvic therapy helped a lot for me, but it still sticks around in the back of my head as something I’d never want to deal with again. My sympathies and condolences.
UTIs suck! Friend of mine had a long bout of on and off until both them and their partner all got treated - Dr thought maybe it's worth eliminating the possibility of them passing back and forth.
Houses are indeed expensive. Feels like everything is these days
Yeah he's had several rounds of home IV. My biggest concern about transmission is him not being able to wash his hands easily in the sinks currently before doing cath care. But he wears gloves. Trying to find a more accessible faucet option for the kitchen while we wait on home modifications.
All of which will also be expensive
Currently dealing with the aftermath of Milton. I'm on the east coast, so I didn't get the brunt of the storm, but the neighborhood I live in is a particularly low area. So I've got 6 inches of water in my house to deal with at the moment. Luckily I still have power and internet, so at least I can use fans and dehumidifiers, and listen to music while I clean up.
Good to hear you are okay. Is the water damage manageable or are you looking at replacing a bunch of stuff?
Luckily it's a block house with tile flooring throughout, so we should be able to clean everything well once the water receeds. I just woke up and am about to head back over and start cleaning now. We knew it would almost certainly flood, so most of our stuff we were able to pick up off the floor and save. My couch will need to be thrown out, but it was a roadside freebie anyway. Overall, it isn't too bad, mostly annoying.
Edit: Just finished cleaning house. Still several things that need to be done, but we've got all the water out and the gunk off the walls and floors. Outside is still a mess but not urgent.
Absolutely horrid. I am a pit that things fall into—i'm falling apart, i'm deteriorating, i'm dying. very volatile. so confusing. no energy. So strong but at the same time so delicate. On the other hand I become very reckless which is to the good (normally I am much too risk averse and guarded)
Stories of wins from recklessness? Turning over that leaf can be so freeing
My most recent achievement is getting my teaching license and degree! Looking forward to beginning in public school teaching early childhood soon.
My son just turned 5 as well, which is exciting.
I also got to send in my vote by mail. Thanks progressive state!
Overall, a great time to be alive.
Congrats on achieving your degree! Do you have a job lined up? Regardless, thank you for going into the thankless field of educating children!
Working on the job now. It's still early in the school year, so the only spots open are subs and paras which isn't what I need right now. I'm already working as a Prek teacher and the school I'm at (private) gives a hefty discount which is necessary for my sons last year there.
I'm keeping my eyes peeled for a new spot opening up at the schools in the area I'd prefer.
Feeling in a limbo state. My partner and I are still figuring out if we're staying together. We took a break from July 15th - August 15th and then decided to try a radically different approach to our incompatibilities. In some ways it's improving, but I'm also not feeling too different. I'm feeling kind of stuck again.
However I had a vacation in Japan!!! But also promptly broke my toe on day 2 - genuinely snapped it in half - and spent the trip (and next 3 weeks) on crutches. It turns out Japan is not made for the crippled. We pivoted our trip quite hard, rented a car, and took to the coast. We still had a nice trip, it was just extremely challenging as well. But I had some fantastic, unexpected highlights as well!
All in I'd say I'm neutral, but hoping to shift into gear - regardless of what gear - soon.
What a hard limbo state, I know exactly how mentally taxing that can feel. Hopefully you can come to a healthy, positive conclusion. Have you two tried couples therapy? It helped my partner and me quite a bit, both as a couple and individually, to help us adjust our communication and be a "better" couple.
Thanks for the kind words. We did couples therapy for 5 years and while I think our communication improved, our issues didn't really. We have a new couples therapist that seems to be helping more. The sessions are more challenging, but I think that's a good thing.
I got laid off from my job this week. I've been thinking to quit soon but this way I get severance pay so I'm happy. I look forward to getting back in shape since I'm no longer tied to a desk all day.
Very anxious about the world, my country in particular. Yesterday here in NL a refugee center that was supposed to open got damaged by a small bomb. Even though they wouldn't get any new refugees, just lower the pressure from somewhere else in the country...
That said, it seems like I finally, finally get a start for my career after 2 years of temp jobs.
There are still many other problems in my life, such as the lack of even a basic appartement(I live with my parents), but maybe I'll finally be able to steer my life on the rails again.
Pretty good all things considered. I've been engaged in pretty continuous social activity, got a few small events going and have a few more planned for the end of the year. The business isn't really "taking off" but it is slowly doing better. I've continued trying to understand and improve with respect to delivering good care for my grandmother, which has been a fulfilling experience in exactly the way I'd hoped it would. I've spent a lot of time piecing together the history of our family, plumbing the depths and figuring out what the "story" to it really is. I think at this point I've got a narrative put together, and doing all of that has made communication go a lot better than before with everyone. There's still much to be done to achieve my bigger aim with that, but progress is progress. Step by step, folks are coming to prioritize the well being of their group. We have some extended family in Florida who were able to leave ahead of the hurricane, seems like all is going about as smoothly for them as can be expected. There are apparently quite a few over in Louisiana, so I'll probably end up making a connection with them sometime in the near future.
I've still been wandering around town and talking to people. Last time I wrote about it, Biden was still running and there was a surprising kind of support around here. That's only gotten stronger since he dropped out, and what I notice now is that it's much, much easier to be upfront about how dumb and crazy Trump's campaign is. The older folks I've talked to really enjoy laying into it now that they don't feel so much like folks will go nuts/try to bully them over who they support. They'll be more direct about how they're feeling and don't do as much of the petty arguing when disagreements come up. Folks are uncertain but not as afraid, if that makes sense, if my limited experience means anything. It's actually fairly rare I come across a die-hard on either end of politics around here. Many are just tired. As always, grain of salt, one guy in a small town, but what I've observed feels pretty significant and I see the attitudes reflected elsewhere when I go looking around online/talking to folks in other cities. Doing that helps out with my other endeavors too - it's slowly building the impression that our venue is a place where everyone is actually welcome, little bit by little bit.
Besides that, as always, doing a lot of reading, catching up with distant friends, preparing for what could be as best I can. As stuff gets more intense, it's like folks around me come to see things I thought they wouldn't, and there's always opportunity in moments like that to turn toward stuff that folks really value - their friends, their family, their community. What difficulties arise are challenges to overcome. What I can't control, I'll work around. The feeling of determination just grows over time, and when I wake up in the morning I'm just grateful it worked out this way. So, it's just a matter of continuing. Can't stop now.
I'm moving house and having a baby, all in the next month and a half or so. That means I got first baby, first mortgage and first (only) marriage, all in a single busy year.
Ahh, your first trip to Home Depot as home owner.
Congratulations! It all sounds super exciting
We just opted to renovate two rooms while wrapping up a grad degree right after our first arrived. Why do we leave these major changes until after the beautiful little time stealer arrives? Haha. All the best to you and your family
Just chilling. I quit/was fired in August and have been relaxing since. A couple weekends ago my friend invited me to Munich for Oktoberfest and I booked everything with less than 24 hours to departure. The festival was great. I met some cool people. Then I added in a train loop through Zurich and Innsbruck before flying home. For the rest of the month I'm hosting various visitors. Some are familiar with the area, others have never been to the state.
I just had a dream where I got another job but regretted going back to work so soon. It was a relief when I woke up and realized I'm still unemployed.
I'm working on a small project for the city (not with any authorization). It's a scavenger hunt in our biggest park. I'll be placing nicely designed vinyl stickers with QR codes on benches/bridges. Scanning each code will bring you to a domain I've set up and check off a zone on a map. No special app required, it's just a website. I'm very proud of how well it's coming along. In the footer I'll encourage people to employ me for contracting or full time work.
Ooo I'd love to hear more about your scavenger hunt, that sounds so cool!
I'll do a post once I launch it.
I only recently learned “quishing” (literally the worst portmanteau I’ve ever had the displeasure of learning) as an attack vector for phishing and scammers, so I think personally I might be unlikely to scan a random QR code unless the URL looked like what I was expecting — and I definitely would avoid well known link shortener URLs, just personally.
I don’t want to rain on your parade, it sounds like a really lovely idea! Just that it happens to be my most recent association with random QR codes at the moment.
There will also be a short URL on it you can type into your browser.
Still dealing with Covid symptoms a week later. I'm still able to get leave approved, and I was going back and forth on if I wanted to go back today, or just extend until Monday. Fortunately for me, new symptoms presented themselves this morning and made my decision for me, hooray!
The idea of working when you’re sick is super familiar to me, it’s been a thing since before I entered the workforce, but I’ve just never understood managers who demand you come into work (and get everyone else sick) while you’re coughing and spluttering all over the place.
I’ve luckily never that pressure it since working in a corporate environment, but if it ever came up, I would work as physically close to said manager as possible, and hope that they feel personally uncomfortable enough to change their mind.
Since it's Covid, it bypasses the usual system of spending your flex days and tough luck if you run out. I probably could have rushed back in if it wasn't available to me, but the additional time away was appreciated, and when rules are arbitrary in my direction, I'm not going to complain.
Unfeeling, unemotional, or maybe some variant on numb, for a long time now.
Since COVID started I've taken precautions to make sure I didn't get infected and bring it home with me. As a result I don't really have social interaction anymore, except for my girlfriend who I live with, and my father who I visit occasionally who also has maintained care and avoidance to not get ill.
I used to have a great deal of online interaction on Reddit... until the API fiasco that felt like a betrayal of the community to me which prompted me to leave and not look back.
I'm on the Autism spectrum / high functioning, ADD, and my girlfriend tells me I'm depressed which may well be true, but I can't directly recognize it in myself.
My father is elderly, but active and in good health... but his outlook on life and the world is fairly bleak, as is mine (climate change, war). He has been making end of life plans and arrangements, going over things with me as to shipping his document archives to a museum that wants to receive them. I'm afraid of losing him - he's one of the few people left in my life, one of the few people left I interact with.
A few days ago he texted me to let me know my friend Phil died from Alzheimer's disease. Phil was a fellow professor who taught at the same university as my father, and back when I lived there we went to the same martial arts studio, trained together, sparred together. Just a wonderful human being. And he just died in the manner that is my personal greatest fear (my mind failing, betraying me, losing who I am). When my father let me know... I... felt nothing. There was just nothing there, no emotion, no reaction, and that scares me.
I experience a variation on executive dysfunction that manifests in the form of 'not doing things', as in I have something I need to do, know need to do it, and then... don't do it. Laziness? Lack of will? You could describe it in those terms I suppose. I've had 'find and speak with a psychiatrist about getting medication' on my to do list for months, found the specific one I want to contact near me, and haven't contacted them. I previously did research and concluded the single most impactful thing I could do that would likely have the potential to snowball into other positive actions is to visit a psychiatrist and ask to be put on Adderall, as it seems this is most likely to help me with the executive dysfunction part of my issues, which would then let me work on the many other things in my life. But it's like the classic 'you can't get there from here' problem, even though there is nothing tangible or easily explainable holding me back.
Caffeine in moderately high amounts does help to an extent (this is part of what leads me to believe Adderall will be useful). I typically have 2 cups of coffee and an energy drink (200mg caffeine, B vitamins and no sugar) in the morning / whenever I get up these days and that does help me get past the executive dysfunction 'hump' so to speak and get things done I need to do in my life - some things at least. Currently I'm cleaning and refurbishing a fairly high end Microhmmeter to sell on eBay (this is my primary means of generating income these days as I mostly transitioned away from work that requires interacting with people to reduce exposure to COVID).
On the one hand, there are a lot of positives to what I do for a living now, at least on paper. I can work whenever I want (or not), wake up and go to bed whenever I want, I don't have any commute for work eating fuel / vehicle maintenance money (except for auction pickups once in a while), and the ratio of money earned per hour worked is way higher than anything I would see from practically any 9-5 job, even with my skillset. I also enjoy it on a technical level, and get a certain kind of fulfillment from repairs and problem solving. My electronics bench is my 'happy place'. On the other hand, I think the lack of socialization is harming me, even though I am typically quite introverted and don't want to interact, it seems that I do have a need for some minimum baseline of social interaction, and I used to get that from work.
So I'm kind of limping along.
I feel that... Socializing is hard to come by, and I've been lucky to have some family gatherings and friends who visit the area for business, but still not as much as I'd like.
Online I find myself lurking in a bunch of small communities, usually centered around hobbies, it's always the smaller communities that are tighter, and you start to recognize people in those forums and chats
As for consuming content, on some level I know it's not healthy, consuming more and more to fill a bottomless void, but at least watching videos with people's faces and voices leaves me more satisfied, compared to reading text all day. I know it's ironic saying that on Tildes lol, but yeah, text websites like Tildes make up just one part of a balanced digital diet, in my opinion
Huh. I have experienced that, though I haven't really thought about that effect directly. I do tend to watch streamers - people who stream playing Magic and one person who runs a repair shop in San Francisco who streams game console repair / misc electronics repair.
One more thing about your situation is when you mentioned you're free to work or not work, that reminded me of times when I was in between work, and gave myself time to decompress, it made a huge positive difference just setting aside some time to rest and forbid myself from thinking about jobs and responsibilities
Instead I would reach out to friends, take short trips, go out for walks, read more, watch shows and play video games, and other hobbies... It sounds pointless at first, but having a hard deadline of when work would start again, like after two months or something, it actually felt really good, the time off made me forget about burnout and I felt renewed and motivated again
(Disclaimer because it's the Internet: I know it's a privileged position, and some people might condescend "lucky you, you get to rest while others work paycheck to paycheck" but I truly think it's essential to focus on mental health and do what you need to reach a healthy baseline, ignore the haters)
I left that other site last year as well and I miss the kind of community it used to represent and maybe still does.
Sounds like you've gotten quite far on the executive functioning health quest! Is your girlfriend concerned -- eg is your relationship being impacted by your current challenges? Would you consider letting her make the appointment and taking you to it and getting the prescription for you? Sometimes that works for others who can't do the social thing or break down mini steps to get to a life-saving thing thing.
In other circumstances that would be a good idea, unfortunately for me specifically her health (mental and physical) is probably worse than mine - physical health definitely, mental health being a much more complex metric than just 'better/worse/value-on-a-one-dimensional-line' of course - but she also has issues with executive function, though probably with different causative roots than me. Short practical summary there is that the suggested situation is reversed for us - I'm the one who takes care of those things for her, at least to certain extents.
Thank you for the brainstorming though, I do appreciate the response.
Oh man that's tough when you both find the same area challenging. On the flip side when you guys find a new hobby to share that must be so much fun when little things like sleep or eating or regular life flies out the window :D
Pretty much just life as usual with the common routine with work, kids, home. I am turning 39 on Monday, so that is a bit weird to approach 40, an age I considered "old people" in the not too distant past. I have some minor back problems, but otherwise feel fine.
It's funny, I am also approaching 40 and when I interact with other 40 year olds I have an inner dialog of "The future is now old man!" and then I realize I'm talking to someone in my own age demographic... and suddenly, I'm old. I consider myself lucky that I have no looming health problems and that my back is doing just fine.
Well, let me see...
I don't feel that bad, though. Well apart from symptoms from 6th day of COVID.
Did you get sick from the cold basement water, or from pathogens in the basement water? I know there's research that says you can't get sick from the cold but I do.
And yikes, was that your first day on the job?? Or hopefully just first day in the office? How'd the office take it? Stressful just reading that
The cause is the pathogens, not the cold temperature, but the cold temperature can make you more susceptible to the pathogens.
Thanks! So it's nose temperature, basically.
Yep! My absolutely-not-a-scientist thought about that is that a mask would help a lot with that considering how warm they keep your lower face.
Anecdotally, during the height of the pandemic when I was wearing a mask all the time, I also noticed a warmer more humid nose helped reduce my snoring at nighttime too! I wasn’t wearing a mask to bed, but wearing it during the day helped me sleep better at night.
Nice, I'll copy paste this to snarks who keep telling me my decades of being sick when cold is somehow all in my head
…but your sinuses are all in your head...?!?
Listen here, you >:)
Haha maybe the problem is when all that snot comes outside of my head. I was perpetually the "do you have a tissue" kid and hated it
Not sure. I might have gotten a small amount of the mud into my mouth when spraying the walls. There were droplets everywhere and I tend to be sloppy about not touching my face. I have noticed that as I grow older, getting cold through translates to a minor cold pretty often, though. I was lucky, there were cases of dysentery and similar diseases reported in the affected regions.
No, not the first day at the $dayjob. Just returning after about 4 weeks. They wrote back to wave at them as I pass the station where I was supposed to get off, where the long distance train did not stop, and told me not to worry. They are very accommodating, best work arrangement I've ever had.
Woah yeah I'm glad you didn't get dysentery or something worse. I hope the first responders and folks in Florida are doing okay with their who-knows-whats-in-it flood waters. good reminder for myself to treat mystery flood water as a contaminant.
Haha that's pretty chill of them, thank goodness :) it sucks getting on an Express/long distance train and just seeing your destination go by....
No good.
As i mentioned here, my mother's health is slowly deteriorating and she is eating less and less. She is 40 kg/88 pounds now.
She had to undergo a big surgery for something that should have killed her and she recovered fine, but her appetite is still non-existent. She is frail and weak. My father, who is 5 years older than her, is strong and a rock, but you can see it's taking a toll on him too. He needs to do things for her all the time now since she can't leave home because of her herniated discs. She can only walk and stand for like 15 minutes before feeling insurmountable pain.
There is nothing really anyone can do, just live day by day. I live in another city and visit every other weekend, but it pains me seeing her like that. Never saw anyone so thin like this.
I'm so sorry ❤️
I'm doing all right, but I feel like maybe I shouldn't be doing so well given some personal things going on, so maybe I'm just a dick.
A cool trick that a friend taught me for identifying if someone is a dick: if they have thoughts like “maybe I’m a dick” then they’re already more considerate than people who are actually a dick.
If you’re genuinely a dick, then either you know you’re a dick, and you own that identity; or the idea that “you might be a dick” doesn’t even cross your mind, because that implies you care about other people enough to not be a dick.
Overwhelmed
Realistically, I'm fine, things are good in my life. There's plenty of stability in my life, I have everything I need and yet, I feel like I'm struggling and completely overwhelmed by life in general.
I haven't been sleeping well, but there doesn't seem to be much I can do about that; I have a load of little tasks that I need to complete, but I'm constantly busy with all these other daily little things that I don't feel like I have time. When I do have time to actually do them, they're the absolute last thing I want to do, because I'm already tired from all the other stuff.
I'm right there with you. I also should be doing ok, but am just feeling like everything is too much lately. I can't speak for your situation, but for me I think it's just a combination of uncertainty from everything happening in the world making the future look pretty uncertain.
I wish you well, and hope we both find our way out of this (whatever it is)
Great, all things considered.
Our first child turns 9 months old soon, renovations of her room and our bathroom are finally done (6 months and I did much of it myself without experience) and a boss that I didn't gel with left and was replaced with someone I quite like.
The things to be considered are that Canada is gearing up for a federal election at some point soon and while the current admin is totally rudderless, the likely replacement is a schoolyard chump with zero ideas outside of defunding my precious public broadcaster.
After 6 months of parental leave and lifting a child (dad) I'm happy to be hitting the gym, losing weight and getting strength back again.
So many injuries that need to be kept up so that they don't hurt - I guess this is what 40 feels like.
I could be doing better as I'm in a bit of a slump atm but overall feeling decent. I apologize in advance for the wall of text below, just feel like ranting haha.
I'm feeling a bit down as our org finally announced all the promotions that happened this half and it feels like every other new grad engineer that started with me last July got promoted. I didn't get promoted as my performance earlier this year was drastically down and I'm currently working to restore it. I know it's not a race or competition to get promoted as fast as possible but I hate this feeling of being "behind". I do have a supportive manager and will be getting a mentor soon to try and help me more so I hope I can get out of this mental slump. I look forward to returning to this post in 6 months and seeing how things change.
I've also been feeling less confident in my company recently and have been thinking about changing jobs. After my company's stock price drastically fell in 2022 from its all time high, an initiative was started to restore the stock price by targeting a certain YoY revenue growth percent to achieve by the end of our FY24. To do so, they hired a bunch of executive leadership from a certain social media company and imported their engineering culture (though without their pay to match). Our code output has tripled and we're shipping projects at light speed. Anyone who didn't like this new environment was quietly told to GTFO. Work-life balance is starting to crumble and people are working until midnight and beyond. After all this effort and crunch, our stock price hasn't changed much and we are further from our revenue growth goal than when we started lol. I suspect leadership is going to further cut costs and increase crunch to try to get things where they want.
They've also been cutting benefits left and right to match other big tech companies. The last benefit we have that separates us from other big tech companies is our super flexible Work From Home policy. Per an internal report in late 2022, something like 50% of all people at my company live 100+ miles from an office. If they were to try and cut this benefit, they'd have to get rid of a sizable portion of the company. However given how ruthless they've been with implementing the engineering culture from the social media company I mentioned earlier, I can see them cutting this benefit and giving people 3-6 months to decide if they want to stay.
Outside of work, I've been feeling good. I've been watching my 1yr old niece grow up and explore the world around them. I've been working on a small coding project to try to rediscover my love for recreational programming. I've been hanging out with my friends more often too. So while work hasn't been fun, life has been fun.
I noticed you used “them” and “niece” so wanted to leap to assumptions and teach you about the wonderful gender-neutral “nibling” and “niblings” to refer to children-of-siblings.
That is all I want to say.
Thanks for the suggestion! I've been trying to be better about being gender neutral where needed but have room for improvement.
I wrote a very cathartic essay about my woes here and then accidentally navigated away from the page. Suffice it to say, shit mostly sucks right now:
On a positive note, I love my partner and dog and they make it all worth it.
I'm crossposting from a parallel universe where I read your longer form essay you successfully posted. Stuff sound tough, dude. Maybe even being paid twice as much wouldn't be worth going to a job you genuinely hate and would feel miserable in?
I'm in awe of your ability to do a plumbing and flooring repair. Hope that goes smoothly and finishes quickly, so you can take that morning poop in a newly upgraded bathroom soon.
🥲 That is a very sweet reply and was lovely to wake up to, so thank you for that.
Writing it was more cathartic than I thought, and it pushed me to stop bothering with the analysis paralysis about the bathroom flooring and just fix the toilet seal, which was a huge relief. No need to make that into a whole project if I’m already running on fumes. I already have enough of a tendency to go full Winnebago man on home repairs as it is 🤣
You’re absolutely right about the work/pay situation. It’s mostly just sunk cost fallacy keeping me there at this point. My partner has (correctly) pointed out a few times that I get to this place after a couple of years with pretty much every job I’ve had, so maybe I need to focus more on myself and how I’m managing the situation than the job itself. Despite being underpaid for the work I’m doing, I am still paid pretty well, and while I don’t enjoy the work and it completely drains me, I have great coworkers and great management. It could be much, much worse.
We don't have winnebago man in this universe rofl thanks for introducing me. "i don't want any more BS coming from anyone, even from me" 😂 I think I'll be stealing that and weaving it into my life
Sometimes we just have to replace the toilet seal and close the ticket.... While it may feel a bit shtty, the whole dang situation might just get way too shtty it we don't :)
It’s such a good phrase and I feel like it is a true nugget of wisdom in that vast sea of profanity. Sometimes we must acknowledge that we truly are the source of BS that is wearing on us the most 🤣
I don't know. I've recently moved out of my family home after a year and a half of being unwell (physically and mentally) , hoping that the location change will help me as I have childhood traumatic issues tied to the place.
I'm not suddenly super happy (I still have pain issues) , but I think I'm objectively doing better in the new place.
But the problem is people keep guilting me for leaving my parent behind (Even random cab drivers) . Saying they're old and alone and all that. But they're not that old. And I go back at least once a month to check in. And I'm not the only child they have.
So I don't really reveal I've moved out to people unless it's in topic or I know they're safe people.
Side note: I just realised this is a public forum with people with many opinions. I hope not to get replies telling me that they're still my parent and all that. I get that all time in person already. =(
Your parent and their doctor are the only people whose opinions matter in terms of whether need someone living with them to take care of them. If they don't think that, screw what anyone else thinks. If your parent or their doctor do think your parent needs care, then you still wouldn't need to be that person, though it would be kind of you to help arrange it.
You've got to take care of yourself.
Thank you! I appreciate you saying that even if they need care, I wouldn't have to be the one doing it. And also I if helped it was because I wanted to. Not because I have to.
I liked to joke that if I hadn't moved out when I did, I would have been sent to jail for some horrific crime within a few years. It was bad enough that it was only half a joke at the time.
I think people who say things like that are projecting their own insecurities and values without ever having taken the time to see you and yours circumstances clearly. That is, these opinions are worth as much to you as their " today I feel like eating out of a garbage can" or their "I'm going to vote for [horrible person]".
Yeah. I often half joke similarly.
It is often difficult to discuss things when people kind of transplant their experiences onto yours. I know they don't realise they're doing it. I do it when I don't realise it too.
But that is a good reminder to have that they don't know the full picture.
It's important to take care of your self, it's not wrong to do that. I don't know why you left, but if your mental health is improving because of it then you did the right thing. Sometimes it's really really hard to put yourself first, it can take strength to make that choice. I hope you have some good supportive friends! You by yourself are worth healing.
Thank you! I don't have many things in life, but I do have great supportive friends!
The people telling you to move back don’t know what it is that you have gone through and can be safely ignored. The thing about abuse is that it’s almost impossible to explain to others what the damage is. If you were to say, for instance, that your parents were neglectful, it’s very easy for a listener to say “oh, they were just giving you autonomy!” Or something like that. I found it’s easier to tell people the result of the abuse instead and that you’d rather not talk about the causes.
Yeah. Same here. If I were to discuss it, I would tell then what my reaction is right now and not what happened in the past.
Mainly because I don't want people to invalidate my experiences.
At some point when someone was telling me that your parents are still your parents, I then mentioned there was abuse. But I didn't go into detail and it was just part of a larger thing I wanted to say.
I hope the change of scenery helps you! A year and a half is a long time to feel unwell and I imagine it was a hard choice to move out but I'm a strong believer of taking care of ourselves first and foremost. When we are well, we can be more available to help others.
There are some grey areas. For example, I'd be willing to sacrifice an amount of wellbeing for my partner, and I don't have children but I imagine I'd make any sacrifice for them. A parent however, depends on our relationship and my own judgment of my wellbeing.
As far as judgments from others go, I wouldn't put much weight on what they say other than their words sharing more about them than you. They don't have to live your life or care about the people you care about, so they don't have much to go off of when they make judgments, nor do they have to deal with the consequences.
Thank you! Yeah. It's hard not to let people's ideas of things get to you. But I have to try.
Not great.
Found out that lady I met on Facebook Dating who had been keeping me at arms length for the past sixteen months had actually been seeing someone else recently. So this whole thing about her CFS/ME making her too exhausted to date has been BS, and she's just been leading me on with no intention of ever putting out.
That's just one of my dating woes. It's honestly soul destroying to actually pay for an app like Hinge or Tinder and get absolutely nowhere. I maybe match with like... 0.5% of ladies I swipe right on, and out of those matches, 60% never reply, 30% unmatch and maybe 10% ghost after the first conversation. Maybe it's a problem with British dating culture and women having impossibly high standards. Maybe it's me.
On the plus side, I may finally be moving out from my childhood home soon. I went to view a one bedroom flat that's going for about £140k. Really want to make an offer, but I'm still waiting for a response from the mortgage advisor who I sent my payslips to yesterday.
I sympathize with you and how much what you're going through sucks, but I must ask -- do you use phrases like "put(ting) out" on a regular basis? Because honestly, as someone who has dated as a woman (albeit not a British one), that's the type of language that immediately rules a guy out as an option. Like, unmatch immediately level.
I don't. The more pissed off I get, the more phrases like that go into my vocabulary.
I would suggest generally to avoid doing this even when you know you don't mean it (maybe especially then) because you're going to subconsciously reinforce incel ideology in your head. It's immensely frustrating to be taken for a ride like this. It's happened to me multiple times. I'm sorry and it shouldn't. But understand a big part of why women are so averse to direct rejection is because they are afraid of men, and you do not generally get second chances at guessing whether a guy is safe. As hard as it is you can't take it personally and you can't let it make you a misogynist.
Online dating is a dumpster fire lately. Have you checked out speed dating in your area? It's back!
Not speed dating but I did go to a singles night that I saw on Meetup. It was a sausage fest to say the least, probably about 85% guys.
Yikes. Not what anybody was after I'd bet
Personally, I can't imagine a worse place to meet someone. I've never been to a speed dating, but it sounds terrifying - the expectation of meeting someone must create such pressure. Ditto dating apps - those are definitely not for me, they only work for handsome men, which I am not.
Why do people here keep treating this as such a difficult task (mostly referring to other comments I've seen on Tildes, not the parent specifically)? One example from yesterday: I was sitting in a park and eating a cake I bought in a cake shop next to the park. I noticed a pretty lady nearby kept looking at me, so I smiled at her (I was in a good mood - it was sunny and the cake was good). She smiled back. I asked if she wanted a piece of that cake. She said yes and we started talking about cakes, books (I also had a book with me), movies... We seemed to click so I asked if she wanted to get a coffee. She did. So easy. No pressure. The worst case scenario was that I would still have one more piece of that cake left for me.
Opportunities like that present themselves every day. All it takes is to be in a good mood, go outside and behave friendly (and perhaps buy a delicious-looking cake). Good vibes outcompete handsome every single time - but those do not get through on those dating apps. There is no doubt in my mind that I would never get a date on any app where you decide based on a picture. And I can't imagine myself being relaxed and in a good mood on a speed dating event.
My theory is that a lot of straight guys put pressure on these types of random encounters to turn into something more. They're essentially treating it the way you describe speed dating. The importance they assign to these types of opportunities ends up manifesting in how they behave when interacting with women, and that alone results in them coming off as desperate or at the very least awkward and uncharismatic in these interactions. Understandably, women tend to respond better to interactions with guys like you, who come off as more confident and less awkward because you're not putting pressure on yourself to turn this extra cake slice into a wife and kids.
Frankly, the attitude you used for a cake offering would get you where you need to go in a speed dating event. It's amazing how few attractive people have game - ie: the ability the riff on situations, joke about it and make connections.
I'd agree that attractive people win in the online space, but again, I don't think it's the only way to stand out. Do cool, different stuff in your photos and talk about why you're great in your bio. This isn't meant to be a lecture as i know little about where you're coming from, but I think it's important that we don't avoid opportunities because of some idea we have about who they're for.
That's a good point.
As someone who's fairly successful on dating apps- it's app dating culture in general.
With that being said, the general statistics on this show that women tend to be a lot more picky than men when it comes to how they interact with dating apps and it's a reflection of how much attention they tend to get - a conventionally moderately attractive woman can easily get thousands of likes per month in a reasonable sized city from men (in many apps, even when they set themselves as interested only in women). If I remember correctly the last time I read some stats on this, I think the average left to right swipe ratio is something like 7 to 1 in women and in men is closer to the reverse (although its skewed by some men who never swipe left in a bid to just get matches with the least time investment).
I wish I had advice for you other than "you need to learn to deal with the reality of dating apps and modern culture" because the way things are... well, it's just not nice for masculine presenting folks. You need to get used to it being a numbers game and you need to get used to people ghosting you, or you need to opt out or set a boundary so you can healthily engage with these (or choose not to engage because it is unhealthy for you to do so). If there are speed dating or other avenues for dating in your area, I'd highly recommend looking into those as a more healthy alternative.
As an aside, if you ever want someone to take a look over your profile and offer tips, I'm happy to do so.
I'm having a rough go of it this week. I'm trying to sort what's situational and what's mental and what's at the intersection of the two. I've been applying for jobs for a while now and am getting zero traction and I can't really figure out why. I've done consultations for my resume, my interview skills (Does this really matter if you never get asked to interview?) and cover letter writing but nothing seems to be panning out. It's starting to feel pretty disheartening. I woke up to five rejection letters yesterday and that just really put a damper on the day and made it very hard to get motivated to apply for more jobs. At least I got one of the more humorous rejections this week: I received an email stating that I would no longer be a candidate for the position as they "were unable to reach me after multiple attempts." Not sure what attempts they made that resulted in them only being able to contact me to let me know they couldn't contact me...
I hate to be the one to say this, but have you used an AI to rebuild your CV/resume yet?
A lot of companies use tools to pick out keywords and AIs can inject them nicely for you.
Just a thought. Good luck with the job search though, I hope something crops up soon.
Thanks for the kind words! I've recently been leaning heavily on ChatGPT to help out with cover letters and resumes, especially cover letters. I feel like it does a pretty good job, especially with a little clean up. Like you pointed out, I feel like it does an especially good job at getting those keywords in there but then, I also have to question my judgement as I also have not gotten a job yet. Either way, thank god for AI being able to write for me because I find that business jerk off style of writing exhausting.
Lost my 8 year old job early July (after moving to new rental place just past October), lost my mobile which had all my precious memories in Feb.. been in a holding pattern the last few months wondering what to do, just doing basics day by day ..i am looking for work but more keen to be offerred work back at the new company risen from the ashes of the one i lost job from (redundancy) - hoping in next two weeks. I really should have got another job in July when i lost my previous one. Been in that motivational neutral loop.... (same pattern when i went through two other redundancies stretching back 20 years......And i turned 55 this year....somethings going to give at some point and im rarely negative person..
Was actually having a pretty good September. Last side project went stupidly well and the bonus was a godsend. And still had a good few prospects on the cards. Figured with that bit of bandwidth, I could finally take some time for myself and have a slow end to the year.
Was even asked to MC and organize part of the family reunion and didnt realize how much i missed presenting and speaking like that. And its a drama free side of the family so we got to have fun with it without having to play politics. Organized a day of Taskmaster style games inspired by family history and had my grandads surviving siblings pick the winners. Probably the best social event this year.
And then the Universe realized it was slacking and now decided to pose a very important question. "Why did you black out while driving?" Thankfully it was at a red light and some good people stepped in but it's not the best situation.
Spent ten days in hospital and doctors still not exactly sure what's wrong, all while the very polite insurance person is asking important questions like: "How many useless procedures will a person be willing to put up with?" And "How much blood do humans really need?"
Combine it with the drama side of the family using this situation to play stupid games and only being able to work at less than 50% capacity before exhaustion.
It just sucks because it's like i didn't event spent the last two years clawing up to Not-Crap. I've messed up my fair share and thnakfull I'm not anywhere near rock bottom again but it feels like I'm pretty far down there. I've taken care of myself, stuck to budget, haven't touched any substances or even a lottery ticket but but it feels like I'm still a coin flip away from a shitshow. And I'm not even enjoying it this time.
Don't get me wrong, I know a lot of people have it much worse right now and I'm not going to throw it all away now in a hiedonistic rage. I'll figure it out. I just really want to know where that line is to be Okay. Because I don't know if I can put in much more to get there.
Comforting to see other unemployed, almost-40s here. 😏
I haven't applied to anything in months.
I will start thinking I should apply to something, but then that gives way to ruminating on frustrations in past jobs, or how applications are insta-rejected these days.
(And yes, I've reworked my resume and even used AI to facilitate creating application materials like cover letters).
So I go back to studying, which is my only solace and enjoyment lately because it feels productive.
If I was smart, I would be studying something other than programming though, considering the overabundance of SWEs looking for work right now.
But at the same time, it is subject matter of personal interest—not for the purpose of finding work. And anyway, I am one of those types who, if I have to learn something for work, will lose all genuine interest and motivation.
Mentally and physically stressed to the absolute limit, but have no choice but to carry on. Due to multiple factors that have stacked on top of each other, I am now faced with the decision to sell our family home and relocate from the west to east coast. I had so many hopes and dreams for this house and for my son's life here, so I feel like I've failed at life absolutely now that I'm unable to grant them. My son is also just now reaching the point where he is establishing friendships with others his age. He keeps mentioning to me how much he loves school and all his friends, and it stabs me right in the heart every time he does so as I know that in just a few short weeks he won't see them again.
My wife and son are moving ahead of me, so that I can take the time to pack and prepare the house in the coming 2 months, and now I'm starting to doubt that I will even be capable of packing everything up and doing all the necessary repairs. I basically have no choice but to do so, so I'll just have to summon the energy from within. Also, I've destroyed my shoulder tendon or rotator cuff while doing landscaping to prep my front yard for the sale so now it hurts every time I lift my arm above my head... yet I still have an entire house worth of things to load within the next few weeks. Yay.
Best of luck. I feel for you. Please don't drive yourself into a permanent injury through overexertion.
I just want to say that our culture makes it seem like having plans fall through is somehow a moral failing. In many cases it is just bad luck and it is insanely common.
You might find the book range by David Epstein encouraging to read. I did.