u/BulkyOwl3005

I live in a country where modular schools are mediocre. In short, you won’t get the right competencies.

I was looking to go a few months abroad to a good school to finish my CPLMEIR, but I got a full time job offered in corporate and since I’m broke af… I’m considering it.
I want to get flying full time asap, but a job while getting there is a huge help in stability.

The company offers working hybrid, which is a huge plus. Although I’m not sure if they would be okay if I work outside of the country, and starting when.. but law so far says it’s allowed.

The work contract would be only for 1 year, renewable. It’s not offering many vacation days, would be impossible to even get half way the CPL with only vacation days. And since you want to get it renewed, assume no vacation days.

Anyone here that did this: working full time and trained elsewhere? How did you do it? How much did you spend? How did you schedule it?
How did you manage things like travel costs, accommodation, etc efficiently?

Ik ben 29, woon zelfstandig sinds mijn 17e, op kamer of studio, en ben er echt klaar mee. Het is zo veel onzekerheid, ben klaar met slechte verhuurders en ben ook klaar met de 15m2 student leven. Ik ga binnenkort afstuderen (carriere switch), en wil ik graag gaan sparen. Ik verwacht een inkomen van 4k p/m bruto (niet lager dan mijn vorige werk dus). Ik heb geen ouders of familie die mij ondersteunen of dingen zoals dit uitleggen.

Ik zie dat meerdere ex-klasgenoten/vrienden en ook online dat zelfs jonger lukt het om een hypotheek te krijgen en geld sparen om een huis (zonder partner) te kopen. "hoe heb je het gedaan? ja gewoon hypotheek en gespaard" niet een helpvol antwoord.

Toen kwam ook een buurman die zelf een klus zaak had en een huis alleen had gekocht. nou dat moet echt toch kunnen ??

Daarom heb ik een intake gesprek gehad met een bank, een met die inkomen (gebaseerd op mijn vorige werk) zou ik ongv. maar 250k kunnen lenen, met een eigen inzet ook, een hoog rente en kom je zo met behoorlijk veel geld kwijt elke maand. Ik wil geen partner.

Als ik even snel naar Funda kijk, 250k kom je niet echt ver... 30m2 of een garagebox. En daarna moet je nog je huis voorbereiden/klussen/etc. en dat is ook duur. Eigen auto..? lijkt me niet mogelijk.

Het lijkt dus best moeilijk met de prijzen van vandaag. Hoe doen het jullie dan?

Sorry voor mijn Nederlands, ik kom uit Italie.

Hoi iedereen, ik woon in een kleine apartment en helaas is er geen mogelijkheid om regelmatig drums te spelen. Ik wil graag dingen opnemen (demos, videos, etc.), ik speel op "semi-pro" niveau en elke keer kom ik tekort aan mogelijkheden om met serieuze projectjes mee te doen of dat ik wil graag doen, een eigen mini opname studio dus. Ik woon ook buiten de randstad.

Ik heb een beetje doorgekeken en heb garageboxen gevonden, opslagruimtes, algemene garages, atelier studios, etc. die in de budget zou passen onder de 200 per maand.

Maar... welke is de veiligste optie? wat is slim? wat doen jullie?

alvast sorry voor mijn nederlands ik kom uit italie.

So I did it.. somehow i landed in a professional band and now I have to up my game. I have played for about 20 years now (I'm almost 30) and had a few years off the drums here and there. I gigged a lot back then, in a very different genre than metal and complex music, and it was a level where not being perfect wasn't a big deal.

After my last gig in 2019, I started practicing very casually next to my job again in 2024, didn't drum for almost all 2025 and literally just a handful of times during last winter. Somehow just a month ago a band called me up asking me to fill in. I said yes because I knew their situation and we had a great click from the start, as well as just a little fun thing to do. So I just sat down and played their songs over and over again and showed up to the rehearsal.

welll........ Little did I know I was going to become their actual new drummer (dang wow child dream came true out of nowhere unexpectedly). (I will post about the band and so on later when it becomes the public announcement). DANG!

In 4 weeks I had to learn their new album, we had 2 rehearsals, and had my first gig last saturday. I enjoyed it like never ever before, and the band was very pleased with the progress.

However now it is time to polish things up and up my game:

- The fills need to consolidate and become consistent, polished. Clean like a new car. Right now they are about 6/10 times clean.

- The timing needs to become a bit tighter. I sometimes oscillate out just a tad, that needs to go.

- The double kick game needs to go up by a lot, I need to be able to do things I have never done before. While I was able to get away with simpler versions of that now, the band expects me to bring this up.

- Some fills that are in the album need to be 1 on 1. They aren't easy.

- Become consistently tight and clean.

- I'll have to become creative with my own voice in the future.

- I am struggling especially on how to make up an effective practice routine: we are talking about skill things but also about maintaining and improving the current album setlist, how do you do this, how do you split your time, how many times a week, and how do you work on details like these? Please be as specific as possible.

I'm getting quite overwhelmed of how much work to do there is in sense of I have no more idea what to work on because there is so much to do.

I am starting again drum lessons next month, but in the meantime I'm looking for advice of what I can do in the meantime.

thanks everyone

I had a channel years ago and managed to grow it up to almost 3000 subscribers, it was mostly about drums and music and towards the end (after I think a year or so) I started getting a good hand for my "niche".

Circumstances in my life changed, and had to take the difficult decision to drop that channel and start posting from scratch for my own safety. So I started over with a new channel from scratch, with a different topic about 2 months ago.

The algorithm changed enormously since 5 years ago when I stopped...

My content is somewhat different too: I went from tips&tricks and playing videos in my old channel, to cinematic storytelling in sports in this channel. I hated doing tips&tricks, my god...

I want to focus on sharing my sport training and races, what I see a lot of creators also doing.

and now while I do feel inspired to shoot videos, I completely burned out in trying to understand how to grow again and it's not fun anymore. I don't get pushed by the algorithm yet because it has too few views to be able to judge that by itself. I see people posting anything they want, yet if you watch youtube advice they say not to do that, the format, the seo, the search, the algorithm, the hook, the good video structure and audience retention, bla bla bla.

I watched tons of youtube videos on growing a channel in 2026 and it is crazy how much advice just doesn't get you anything useful nor any specific information but just empty talk.

I don't do youtube for the views, but I do feel sad it doesn't grow or my videos get anywhere, get my point?

Since that the old strategies don't seem to work.... I'm asking here: what strategy works today to find the proper video topics?

I started playing in a serious symphonic metal band and my Tama double kicks 310 are letting me down:

I replaced the springs which made a huge difference. But the shaft, the beaters and the system that holds the beaters are crap and giving up. At this point I may as well buy a new one....

the shaft twists, the beaters are too heavy, the slave for some reason hits the bottom of the platform when playing but not while calibrating.. I'm so tired of these pedals. The beaters get discalibrated in height every time and overall I find myself fighting frustration after frustration with them. They feel heavy and they take a lot of effort to play in comparison with other pedals.

Tama has really let me down here and I don't want to buy Tama pedals ever again. I don't trust them anymore and don't trust that I can bring them gigging around.

My budget is to stay around but below the 1000 euro if possible...

I'm looking at direct drive pedals, long board. What do people go for these days? I'm specifically looking at the DemonDrives, DW9000 or Trick. Am I missing any better pedal for that budget?

Hey so, yea as the title says, I have ADHD. Schedules are my worst skill. Years I work on this and I can't manage to fix it... so here I am asking advice.

My biggest issue with triathlon is consistency. I try to follow what everyone does basically... 2x a week every discipline, 2x a week gym. And find myself doing about half of it on the average.

How do you guys with ADHD do this, how do you overcame this issue and became consistent?

disclaimer: Please save yourself the "just get up and do it" comments if you don't have adhd and get the point.

Hi everyone, ironically enough I am studying aeronautical engineering. It is actually going pretty well, but being dyscalculic does have a LOT of issues and challenges.

To keep the story short here, don't give up on your dreams. I felt like I was a complete idiot and was bullied at school by teachers, which made it worse. However, thanks to a few friends and the right supportive people believing in me, I actually gave it a shot. Fast forward to a year later, the improvement on math is massive and now I can do most of the stuff all by myself.

I would like to ask a few tips, because so far with my therapist we have not been able to find what works yet.

- I really struggle confusing if I have to add or substract things: for example atmospheric pressure calculations. Even if I know the rule of thumb "from high to low beware below" and such things, I keep confusing it. I struggle making the right mental picture to get the right answer. I even draw it wrong.

- I for some reason sometimes get lost with things I used to understand a few months ago. And then don't understand them anymore by myself.

The biggest problem is that most of the times I actually do the right calculations, but end up summing up or substracting, the way around. The exams are made in such a way for you to fail, which are not dyscalculic friendly at all, so I end up confusing the result so easily by getting tricked I clicked the right answer. While I did all steps right, I end up getting 0 points for clicking the wrong answer.

- I struggle with answers that look very similar. Either it is a decimal, or written in a different (wrong) way, or inverted, etc.

Does anyone have some useful tips? thank you so much in advance.

Hi guys,

I know T gives hairloss, I know also that you could eventually use DHT or finasteride (and minoxidil).

I understand that if I don't want to loose all my hairs I have to now very quickly step to actions.

My issue is with my body recomp/muscle building. I struggle so much with my body dysphoria, I just start to notice a little recomp and this has been such a big issue, but if I would bald out I would look like a bald woman because of my head's shape.

What would be smarter to do? What can I do both on short and long term starting now?

Can I lower my T dose safely without loosing more hairs like this?

If I lower my T dose, I risk my body recomp not happening? (I have been 1 year on gel and it didn't do sh*t, I'm now a year and a half on injections doses below). I only started to see body recomp/significant masculinization from this last T change last month.

I urgently need to change this situation.

Since last month (I got changed from 0,3ml to 0,4ml weekly androtardyl) my hair thinned out and I lose incredibly much hair. I just noticed today out of nowhere I even have a hole, which heart broke me. I see myself every day on the mirror, I am pretty sure this huge hair loss happened within this recent time (headphones may have helped worsen it). My hair got quite thin and quite... different?

My hair is one of the nicest things I have of my body... and something that gave me euphoria.

I booked an appointment with my endo about this, earliest is end october.

I'm 2 years on T and my monthly visit stopped already about a year ago+. I just wonder if it is normal to feel like some days at the gym you are completely overperforming or performing well, and other days you can't go further than 4 exercises because of the tiredness?

I always do my T shots on saturday, and I go Tuesdays, Thursdays and Saturdays to the gym. On an average, I have been consistenly skipping 1 session a week... so realistically only going Tuesdays and Saturdays. It is a bad habit I want to break, but haven't managed yet. The tiredness is one of the issue why...

I have had a recent blood test done and everything was normal. I have also passed my yearly medical test for my job and the blood/urine was also fine.

I sleep well, but I am concerned about a few things of my health. I wonder if it has anything to do with being ftm (hormones, or what not).

I recently started to pick up swimming more seriously, with the idea to compete as a hobby. So I signed up to the only club in my city. The staff is kind.. but that's about it.

We get no feedback, ever. I feel like I am left with more questions than progress and feel I'm stagnating on everything I could get better at.

People seem to be very social between each other, but while I am not someone social myself, if you say hi people don't even answer or say anything even if you are in front of them. It feels off af?

I don't want to make it sound that they are terrible, but it left me wondering quite a lot of things. I saw a different group train the other day and their coach was all the time with them giving feedback and so on... while we are left alone.

The staff is very kind, but I wish we had actual coaching even if we already know how to swim.

After two months there, I'm thinking to leave. Or is this normal and nothing else than my expectation that is off?

I hope to not come across like the overambitious post with no realistic future chance, lol. I have recently joined a club (the only one in my small city in a small country in Europe) and unfortunately, while they send some people to the nationals like probably every amateur club here, the club lacks serious abilities to get better training/results and train seriously, most people just go for fun and don't really have any specific competition goal.

I know that if I would really focus, I could get far. I have already a good track record in a different sport with two provincial titles, but to achieve that it requires the right coaching and the right people that know how to get there.

I have switched from said sport to triathlon. Therefore have a lot of questions that so far my club was unable to clearly help me out:

As a difference from my previous sport, triathlon can also be accessible to more individualistic competitors. This is new for me, and I am highly interested how far you could get if you would have the proper coach.

My first goal is to get a good result out of the national championship. Where I live anyone can sign up for the national championship. At some point I will have to find a better club or coach to achieve this. I don't believe that you can easily get a good result if you lack the right coaching.

I am aware that you can sign up to the IronMan or T100 and if you qualify, do their world champs. But I wonder what else is out there outside of hobby/amateur level?

But after that, what am I supposed to do/go: Is indeed a personal coach enough or you have to be bound to a club?

Then the country issue: I have two nationalities, which are NOT the nationality of the country I live in. In the sport I used to do before, this was a serious game stopper because it required to be signed up in other clubs in the countries I am from, cannot get the local national championship result to qualify there, etc. And then the federations wouldn't even help you out to figure it out. And the irony is that there are athletes training everywhere, yet somehow I wasn't able to get to the right path. We had ranking opens and qualifying events, but I was unable to go without (either of my nationality's) club's representing me. So I assume that Triathlon has the same. In that sport used to be that if you had good results, eventually you could "bid" a place and make the qualifying championship to get in.

But it's been long time since, I have no idea if this works the same still and if Triathlon also works like this: Could anyone please explain how it works with Triathlon in Europe?

Please understand that I am not saying I will win everything, I am just trying to understand what steps should I take and if it works out in results, what can be next. There is only one guarantee: train hard and do your best.

Hi everyone, I have been swimming since I remember (because of family being olympians) but picked it up seriously about 3 months ago, 2-3 times a week. This is my second attempt to pick it up seriously.

I do feel and notice progress in the way I swim, but I still don't see significant progress with building distance.

I started going to a swimming club where they give us a workout for the day and most of the times struggle going through it. I first got put into a masters group, but while the form was fine I could not keep up with their workouts, so I got put with a different more chill group. And still, I think depending on the day I can finish about 50% of the workout and most of the time cannot finish the set as written (have to take more rest).

My family members who taught me to swim say it will come with time, but retired now and don't seem to want to give much advice. The coaches say that it will build up alone, but I somewhat feel pressure to perform from them and my peers.

I still cannot do 200m non stop. I can do 100m just fresh, and then start slacking towards my next 100m, and the rest goes worse and worse, have to take stops every 50m and technique starts to degrade, then start being unable to finish the 50m. Then start struggling with breathing as I get out of sync and get too tired.

I feel like I am the only one struggling at my club, and everyone else can follow the program just fine.

Before you downvote on this question, I want to just make clear I am asking for your perspective because I just don't have anyone to compare on my level to understand what is going on with myself. Everyone in my circle is just either retired pro or serious amateurs, or retired serious amateurs and are not giving any extra information or advice or explanation. This is really confusing and it makes me feel my body is just not made for this.

I had signed up for a sprint triathlon months ago, thinking I could build up the distance with a proper workout, but so far I wasn't really been able to break through it.

How long did it take you before you could do 500m non stop? Can you please share your beginner experience and how you built it up, what you struggled with with distance, etc?

It would add so much more value and perspective! And probably also be useful to more people.

Since this morning out of nowhere I have pain like if I would get the bleeding but nothing is happening.

Is this the famous atrophy pain? Does this pain go away or should I be worried? Do I have to do anything? Is this concerning?

I’m two years on T, my period stopped end last year if I remember correctly

I have only read about atrophy on this forum, I know nothing of it more precise

A few months ago I was cleaning out of anger from a discussion with my uncle and by accident I broke a bottle which was my safe object. This was given to me by someone I love but currently don’t speak to. It used to help me calm down from PTSD attacks, feel safe and somehow feel connected to this person. I haven’t felt safe at night and sleep really bad since it broke, and somehow feel odd and like something is missing and especially struggle to feel her presence so much it feels “over”.

By recommendation in this Reddit I bought a new bottle and put a little loving message about and that I give love when I hold it. But it isn’t the same. I haven’t managed to build a connection with it although at night I hold it like I used to with the original bottle. I just can’t feel connected to this replacement object. It freaks me out and I can’t seem to ground myself as good.

I try not to be superstitious. But I can’t help it. It’s mostly out of fear…
I’m afraid that having broken my original bottle by accident broke that connection between both. To the other side I would find it bs that a bottle would break a relationship ofc.
Sometimes I feel like the original bottle broke because that person would ever take that place in real (in a normal way). Sometimes I feel hopeless.

Could someone please clarify how the connection wouldn’t be broken despite I feel this way?
How do I regain this connection feeling?

I started MMA just this month. My background is in taekwondo (old style) and kickboxing. I realy like MMA but my biggest issue is that I have 0 idea what to do with the grappling part. My gym has both BJJ
(gi), wresling and grappling, and I am considering joining one of their beginner classes.

My grappling is currently an improvised survival strategy based on the very few hapkido cross-training we had in taekwondo, which is not that useful at all (because I just know too few of it) and is not really grappling other than a few locks I remember.

My peers have significantly more experience with grappling, and they basically fold me in an origami in 2 seconds. One of them recommended me to join the grappling course, which led me to this post.

My gym gives MMA specific classes (x3 a week) including all 3 disciplines of defense, striking and grappling. So far I have been attending these classes from time to time, next to kickboxing. I have by now watched a lot of youtube videos on bjj and mma, and tbh instead of getting more sense of it I am getting more confused.

I also hate skin-to skin- contact due to past severe abuse, which is making MMA somewhat a challenge on itself to get used to it. I don't particularly like bjj or wresling, grappling, etc. other than just get good at MMA. I find it quite uncomfortable and often limits me from going to MMA class. This would have probably been wildly different had I not been abused. My mental is to get through it at some point with positive exposure.

So here are the questions:

How should I structure learning grappling?

Should I start BJJ or grappling, both, or should I just keep only the MMA classes?

What should I focus on, must know for MMA?

Since I already train 3 times a week kickboxing, and other sports+gym, isn't adding BJJ too much to the entire equation?

I just want to do a few smokers in the future, and compete more seriously in kickboxing for now. Martial arts is keeping me sane and is an addictive passion I can't live without.

TW: dysphoria talk both the good and the ugly

I will write something a bit long to read, if you like reading. With the purpose of connecting and motivating you with sports. I feel like we often get intimidated to pursue sports seriously... so here is a story to share.

I (29) complain a lot that I feel I don't pass. My body shape and my profile especially... and my lack of muscles. I take my shirt off and there is 0 visible muscle, just a tiiiiiiny bit on my arms, I look like a peer and without a shirt. I'm two years on T and struggling a lot to gain any muscle visible, I'm quite tall and that does not help.

I have always done sports especially Taekwondo (old style, for those who know). After transitioning I joined a new club and started clean.. this was just two years ago. I never came out there, but starting to spar with cis men intimidated me a lot out of nowhere. I went from "the strong woman that can spar men also in competition" to "my body isn't like theirs so I'm going to get beaten up". I had the idea that people kind of knew, but kind of didn't, sort of that ambiguous time where you pass most of the time but people figure it out easy enough. Being the thin tooth stick I am, now sparring with men (did all my life as a woman) somehow felt different: I did lack the strenght, but it was also very much mental.

I did spar men all my life during training... I just felt so intimidated. Men are stronger, I am smaller, my bones are smaller, bla bla bla. Sure, true... but give it time... and I repeat this while being dysphoric af now.

Looking back two years ago, I do see the small beginning of the changes I wanted (even if I am not done):

I gained 10kg, this helped soooo much. I changed my diet, and I finally fixed my lack of endurance. I did gain strenght (not muscle..), which also helps. I do look somewhat more masculine somehow, but I still feel not enough.

As Taekwondo changed rules over the last 20 years, competing became really boring to me and lost the spark for something new after so many years of "the same" and "yet another shitty bullshit rule" and "sparring isn't what it used to be". So about 3-4 weeks ago I had enough and finally switched about 95% to kickboxing and MMA, and still do taekwondo once a month just for the forms and black belt dan progression.

Starting at the kickboxing/MMA club was like restarting this phase of insecurity and dysphoria again, but a tiny step better. However now, these guys (especially the MMA guys) are all jacked up, short hair with cauliflower ears, beards and look intimidating af. These guys are not afraid to knock you out if they are allowed. I said to myself "damn.... goals. Shit". I do admit I still feel dysphoric.

Comparing myself to a guy who was funnily enough born the same day, same year as me but cis, same weight (!) and same height (!!) (Crazy). Our bodies are significantly different and envy it so much. Of course, he is a pro, he lives out of this. But I can't help but think "I want that too". And then often get stuck into the dysphoria loop.

But something did change:

Twice got kicked in the "groin" recently, and my sparring partner were worried and started faking it. The first time was at Taekwondo, we were practicing a combination and he hit me in my groin and my leg, which my shin did hurt quite a lot (for weeks). He thought my pain reaction was from my groin, so I took the opportunity to say yes while in reality my shin was hurting like hell.

The second time, today, in kickboxing sparring day instead. We spar with everyone, greatly enjoy. We did sparring rounds every 2 minutes changing partner rounds. I got to spar with a woman probably around my age who is much much better than me. And by accident, she hits my "groin". I feel nothing of course, but have to fake it... she felt sorry, and we entered a loop of "Im really sorry" "oh dont worry about it its really okay" lmao. Because what else am I supposed to do...? lol.

Starting to see a small light

The dynamics greatly shifted by the changes that T brought. As I see these "micro" changes, my confidence and self esteem went up a lot. My strenght also improved, even if I am still under the "beginner male lift weights category" despite years at the gym and have 0 visible muscles, I do feel so much more confident to spar with cis men. And with MMA and kickboxing, it is full contact without head or hogu, therefore getting hit in the face and in your body a tiny bit too hard by accident isn't unusual. But somehow now, I can handle it. I do recognize my limitations to work on with my body, but I feel I can do it. I see I can do it. I am most of the time not afraid anymore but feel one of them. (Taking in mind dysphoria moments)

None of the trainers know I am trans. None of the gym knows either. Yet today, after this second groin incident and the class was over, my trainer came and congratulated me for my technique and that I was doing very good. That if I would continue like this in few months I would see progress very fast. And that really felt huge, considering all this effort to pass and stand a jacked up cis guy in the cage.

Something definitively is changing... nobody is suspicious anymore, and even if I lack visible muscles like my parring partners, they don't doubt I am a man too. I don't need to be suspicious anymore, I don't need to out myself anymore.

These small changes, maybe they are more visible to someone who doesn't know me or see me often than myself looking every single day if there is anything new. My shoulder's shape changed, my face masculinized somewhat.. even if I can't grow much beard at all. The haircut helps a lot, and overall gaining those 10kg did help to look more masculine as T does its job.

I swim too. I don't pack, which is a dilemma I have not been able to solve yet... (advice welcome) I am insecure af if someone ever looks and there is nothing.. so I tend to cover myself, which makes me more embarassed. The packing also is dysphoria inducing to me and so uncomfortable. But yet again, fortunately, nobody is suspecting it. Nobody is looking weird, and I am treated as another buddy.

While just last week I was doing a post about my T results not being there after two years, I definitively do admit to realize these changes exist, and they have really made my quality of life so much better. Even if I could write a full list of things that are not as I want them to be.

I guess yall are right, give T its time... but dang, it's so difficult to get results.

Anyways, I'm off to buy a groin protector now.... just in case. Seriously. lol.