u/Brechtian_

I'm 27. I am happily married to a lovely man. I have excellent friends. A job I like. Hobbies. My family is lovely and close knit. My in laws are also lovely.

I have had low level depression and anxiety my whole life. I've been to therapy many times, and tried lots of modalities, but I've never felt it that helpful. I'm also on the spectrum, which doesn't help.

I do all the things you're supposed to do. I get out in nature, I work out, I eat well, I sleep well, I see people and I do stuff off-line. And none of it is working. I'm feeling increasingly depressed about the future in general, about meaning, about my life being stuck in a safe rut, about everything. I burst into tears at nothing. Its awful. And I know how self indulgent this feeling is too, as a white woman in a wealthy country with a paid off house and a good job. People have real problems out there.

I don't know what to do anymore. I have a constant pit in my stomach and I don't know how long I can keep my mask up around people and hide how I am. It's awful.

That's it, that's the post. I'm just so damned chuffed that the growth this spring officially gets her over my 173cm height.

I like news based podcasts that lean left, but I find a lot of the commonly recommended ones sort of, US focused or with annoying hosts (e.g. Some More News, It could Happen Here). Are there any that present things a bit more neutrally? I like Novara okay for instance.

I tend to bloat after eating pretty much every single type of camping food. And I find all the hiking pants I own are either too loose or too tight, depending on this factor. So I'm after some that can be adjusted.

I have a friend who I've known since university. She's always been a pretty staunch feminist, but a lot less actively involved in organising than me. She's also always been a bit of a hippy.Lately, she's been sending me and talking about a lot of things that seem to be the beginning of a pipeline.

It started with feminine energy stuff, which over time has been slipping into anti birth control content. Now she's gone from that to some weird anti Vax talking points. She's also thinking of having a baby, and very worryingly going down a rabbit hole on free births and anti pain med births etc. I'm not discounting medical misogyny, but some of the things she's saying (like that women's bodies know what to do, modern medicine has just stolen women's knowledge and all medical intervention on childbirth is wrong etc.) Is downright dangerous.

How do I push back on this without becoming someone she can't trust because I "shill for big pharma" or whatever? I'm really worried about her.

I'm a woman (important context) and love hiking. I've never done it by myself though, always with friends or a partner or family. But I would like to start doing overnights by myself. I like being by myself in the bush when I'm at my family's rural property, and I think I'd get a lot out of it.

However, obviously there's a pretty strong fear factor, especially being a woman by yourself. How do you get over that initial hump of reservation about it?

ETA I'm Australian, so not scared of major land predators since we dont have them and snakes are only an issue in summer, when I don't hike out of fear of bushfire.

That also means I can't carry a gun or even most bladed weapons because there's no real access to them