u/ComplaintExtra5955

Hey, I am 20F and when somebody asks what do I most regret in life, it usually think back to this date I had. It was in high school and it was with this boy I really liked at the time. However, when we were out, I made really fucking weird and sexual jokes (and opened up about traumas and personal things you wouldn’t really tell anybody). Surprisingly, he gave me a second chance and he FaceTimed me. I then showed him… yeah some really sexual stuff ( I am too embarrassed to even write it on an anonymous post, it was that bad). He obviously stopped talking to me (rightfully so) and told his friends. I then kinda became that one creepy as girl in school and people would make fun of me and harass me for it.

It makes me sick of what I did. I had zero social awareness and was entirely socially inept. You’d think I had been molested as a child, but I have no recollection or suspicion of that happening. However, I was facing neglect and severe emotional abuse from my narcissistic dad. Soooo, it would be safe to say, I did what I did was because of daddy issues. I often confused sex for true closeness and connection because I didn’t really feel that I had much of that growing up.

I didn’t really put in perspective of what I did until I had a date later in college with a guy, who was not only weirder, but creepier than how I was back then. I hate that I made him feel the same kind of terrible uncomfortableness. Gaining more social skills made me realize how sick I was too. I am writing this on Reddit because this is probably my biggest regret in life and it eats me alive everyday. I hate how weird and creepy I was when I was younger, and I envy people who had a normal childhood (or at least didn’t make such awful decisions as I did). I want to run away from my hometown, I am so shameful and embarrassed.

Hey, I am 20F and all my life I have struggled with being a people pleaser. I had people (especially my own friends) walk all over me, take my kindness for granted, and treat me like trash. I am so angry that anybody would treat someone like they did to me. The anger and sadness that I let these people use and abuse me is indescribable. I also never really stood up to them either and I still see some of these people from time to time (distanced myself a lot though). My first bully was my narcissistic dad and that is the root cause of this issue. But, I would say my self respect and confidence has grown a lot since then. However, I still feel an immense rage when I remember how I let myself get used and abused by terrible people (that I also had a deep love and respect for). I feel so frustrated and sad for my past self, it eats away at me everyday.

Help?

Hey, I am 20F and I have no clue what healthy and mature communication looks like. Everyone I have ever had in my life had a crazy communication style. Whenever there was ever a conflict, either be my parents or my friends, it would be full of yelling, cussing someone out, guilt tripping or insulting. Is this normal? This made me scared to communicate honestly. Am I too sensitive? I also have no clue how to communicate openly and honestly without completely avoiding it because I am scared of us both screaming and insulting each other.

I feel like I have always seen friends have a big fight and then having to later apologize for it (for every conflict). Am I just surrounded by crazy and immature people (probably with anger issues)? I also avoid making friends because I whenever there was a conflict in the past with a friend, they would just go straight into yelling or a big argument. I also had no boundaries and was a people pleaser so I feel like I just let them treat me this way.

However, someone told me that this communication style is actually really toxic. What does a healthy one normally look like? How do you let the other person express all there feelings without invalidating them and protecting your own boundaries? Is it normal to let someone yell or scream at you when they are really angry? How do you reconcile after a fight? Is it normal to let your friend be a total bitch/asshole to you because they were angry or sad? What are some red flags I can point out?

Hey, I am 20F and I would safely say that I have been a bad friend all my life. I’ve always been very avoidant, shy and awkward with people. I would blame this problem on having to deal with the emotional abuse of a narcissistic dad all of my life but it does not excuse my past behavior.

One thing about me is that I am a chronic people pleaser and cannot stand up for myself or communicate honestly for the life of me. I will hold a lot of resentment and anger in me. I deal with these emotions by being avoidant. I have done this with all of my friendships. I have ghosted pretty close friends (some of those who considered me their best friend) before and I feel terribly shitty for doing that. I have serious friendship trauma where my friends became my biggest bullies and would just walk all over me due to the previous qualities mentioned. Some even got pretty emotionally abusive, drained the life out of me and caused me terrible insecurities.

I want to communicate honestly because I know I can do it (I do it with my bf and my family all the time), but when it comes to friendships, I just get so terrified when it comes the time to stand up for myself. I don’t really have much faith that I will ever be able to do it (or it will take me a couple of decades) because of this intense fear. I know I am a terrible friend and that is why I avoid making friends due to my fear of not being able to stand up for myself (and also why I have none at the moment). I am trying to work on these qualities about myself so I can be a good friend in the future but I just wanted to vent on how bad of a friend I was in the past because I feel so terrible. I deeply envy those who were always good friends, can communicate honestly and those who have healthy long lasting ones. I desperately want what they have.

Help?

Hey, I am 20F and as I make more self improvement posts about myself, I come to realize that I all my problems point to me being completely desperate for validation. I have no internal validation and in order to make myself feel worthy, I look for it socially. I am desperate to be liked (especially by other women) and constantly look for love outwards instead of inwards. I looked up the reasons for feeling this way and I saw that growing up with a narcissist (like my father) and facing years of emotional abuse will surely cause it. I always grew up shaping myself to be liked to earn love, whether that was with him or my friends. But that led me to being a people pleaser and constantly walked all over. I feel damaged really, by all the abuse I have endured.

I feel a terrible hatred for people who don’t like me, even if it is a good reason for not liking me or that it shouldn’t matter in the first place. I want to feel loved and I always try to put on this image that I am charismatic, funny, charming, witty, creative, etc. I hide my real quirky personality with a performative normal one. I do this even when it is completely fake and even if I wouldn’t even really like the person. People admiring me or liking me = love, in my mind, even if the relationship is completely fake. I just want to feel validated and loved.

I hate feeling this way… I want to be confident, self assured in myself, love and validate myself. Any help?

Hey, I am 20F and I noticed today, when I was hanging out with a new friend, I talked like I was a ditzy air head. It is purely out of social anxiety and not wanting to come off as cold, too serious and not fun to talk to. I do not like talking to people who are too serious so I try not to be that way. She made some cracks to my expense (which kinda stung a tiny bit but I mean, I know how I was coming off and that this is not who I normally am). She definitely thinks of me as a lil dumb and kinda weird like most of my other past girl friendships.
I hate always trying to come up with a coherent response, keep the conversation flowing, and not get in my head too much. But because I am trying to be “out of my head” I come off as an airhead.

I hate it because when it comes to boys, guy friends and dates, I come off as intelligent and I am super confident and sure of myself. I wouldn’t mind starting arguments or cussing them out if I needed to. But when it comes to girl friends, I act dumb, fun and a people pleaser so they like me and want to hang out with me. When I am fully confident and not socially anxious, I can come off as intimidating so I don’t really want to scare nice people off.

Help?

Hey, I am 20F and a few years ago, when I was in high school, I used to be very confident. Honestly, I would go as much to say I was arrogant and full of myself. But, overall, I was very sure of myself. However, I had poor social skills and awareness, so I made others very uncomfortable by being unintentionally mean, rude, weird and creepy. People obviously did not really like me. I feel incredibly guilty and shameful for making people feel this way. I have gained a lot more social skills and awareness since then.

I am now very hyper vigilant of whether people like me or not, and feel extremely guilty if they do actually not like me. I find all and any ways to blame myself for them not liking me. I instantly tell myself that I am doing something annoying that I am not aware of instead of saying that maybe there are other reasons (that are out of my control). I am completely unsure of myself. * I have friendship trauma and have faced many years (my whole life) of narcissistic and emotional abuse from my father. I am a people pleaser but I have been breaking from that mold.

I don’t know how to be confident and sure of myself again because I made so many people uncomfortable before. I feel like I get socially unaware when I am confident and do not trust myself when I feel that way. Do you relate? Any advice on how to stop doing this?

I’ve been watching videos on how I could be more successful in life and a lot of these videos are saying you need to have an inflated ego to be successful. A delusional sense of confidence they say. Then as examples, they will show a lot of famous people who are rich and successful such as Ronaldo, Eileen Gun or Kanye West. “They needed to have a delusional sense of self belief to get to the top” or “you need to think you’re at the top before you are”. But is this actually true?? Did most of these successful people actually have this mindset before they got famous or did they just develop this sense of arrogance as a result of getting famous? “Oh I’m getting a bunch of attention now so obviously I’m the best”.

I’m not doubting that they are very talented, but don’t people who believe they are so much better than what they are fall to the Dunning-Kruger Effect? I heard that people who often doubt themselves are the ones who are actually very knowledgeable and talented sooo…. What do you guys think??? What makes these famous people so rich and successful? I feel like there must be normal people walking around with twice the talent, work effort, knowledge or skill as these stars but they don’t even get 1% of the attention they get. What is it then? Luck? Putting themselves out there? Being born rich? Good connections?

Hey, I am 20F and I have been watching videos on why Gen Z is known as the lonely generation. These made me reflect on why I am so unsociable since I always thought it was just apart of my nature. I am currently in college and I would say for the past two years, I had no friends and felt extremely lonely. I felt like there was something extremely wrong with me. It’s not like I’ve always had a ton of friends but none at all now? I always blamed this problem with the severe mental health issues I was going through. However, I now realize that I have always been lonely. I would always sit on my iPad, iPhone or computer when I was younger and watch YouTube videos all day. When I did have to interact with somebody, I had a lot of anxiety and I have always avoided people (even my own friends). This had led to very underdeveloped social skills and being known as the “weird kid”.

I thought being the “weird kid” was always tied to my identity but I now feel a deep sense of self hatred because I realize how I have come off in the past. I have took a step back and saw that I have been coming off as that socially unaware, self centered, kinda mean, pretty rude, kinda creepy, weirdo who is also deeply negative. I feel embarrassed that I was that way now I am breaking out of that identity and realizing that other people are also weird (or weirder than me). Friendship trauma also caused me to avoid friendships. I was friends with bitches with anger issues. I always had poor boundaries and communication skills. I am not going to say I was that great of a friend but I will say I did not deserve to be screamed at and cussed out for something not that serious. I have always had trouble keeping up with people out of anxiety, self-centeredness and friendship trauma. I am going to say I was actually a terrible friend due to my selfishness and past experiences. I did not treat myself or other people with empathy, decency or respect. I feel terribly guilty.
I would safely say I used my phone as a comfort device and a distraction from all this mess. Overall, It made me feel better to be locked up at home in my own world than deal with my own social anxiety, judgement or face whatever nonsense I was up against.

Anyways… I made this post because I saw this video of a older woman who is a teacher (30s or 40s I think) talking about how Gen Z no longer hang out with each other after school. She went on an anecdote of how she was never in the house because she was constantly hanging out with people and doing fun things. I became incredibly jealous and angry at myself. I feel like a wasted so much life, time and my childhood.

I know this is not a unique problem, but I just want to know how to get over the guilt of being a terrible friend/person and wasting my childhood due to social anxiety and trauma. I hate being so weird, self-centered, rude and terrible. It is kinda eating me away… do any of you relate?

Hey, I am 20F, and I recently realised that no matter what, my brain will get over one problem one day and then get under a new one the next. It is like my brain is addicted to feeling completely neurotic all the time. I looked it up, and apparently the neurotic feelings I constantly feel are my brain's daily dose of dopamine. But now that I know this information, I don't really know what to do with it to lower this neurotic behavior. Do you guys have any ideas? Do any of you relate?

I feel like I am completely uncomfortable being confident and happy. On the days when I do feel confident, I usually catch myself, and then I get anxious that I am being completely arrogant and annoying. I also feel like I am going to say something stupid (because I get pretty talkative and friendly) and that I need to "humble" myself. I also think this neurotic behavior makes me feel like I am always "improving myself" when in reality, it is just holding me back.

Sorry for the rant (since this subreddit got rid of the vent tag for some reason). Can you guys help with any of this?

Hey, I am 20F and I have a narcissist dad. All my life, I have dealt with his guilt tripping, criticizing, emotional abuse and etc. I live with my mom and I don’t see him that much anymore but I still go to lunch with him every now and then (once every week/two weeks when I am back in my home town from uni). I rely on him to pay for my college and handle my financial aid, so that is why I still see him. I have severed all emotional attachment because I have now recognized his abuse.

However, I am scared to cut him off because I am frightened with the thought of being on my own, getting a job, taking out loans for college and handling my own financial business. I know this is completely normal adult things but I think he has convinced that I cannot do it or I am too dumb to do this type of stuff on my own. This stuff is unfamiliar to me and I don’t know how to get more information about money, college loans and this other stuff. I don’t know a thing about money or having a job and I feel like a little kid having to rely on her parents for everything. My mom has also been financially manipulated and abused by him too. We both have zero clue how to handle money. I already plan on joining the Air Force after my bachelors (and hopefully before medical school) to pay off loans. I am heading into my junior year. I might wait till then?

Help? Where do I get more information about money?

Hey, I am 20F and ever since I was 15, I have struggled with being a people pleaser. I had a friend who had anger issues and was a very confrontational person. Ever since I made this friend, I had shrunk myself to fit in the friend group and to have friends in general. It was fun to hang out with her but it was more of a toxic up and down situation. She was very mean to me since she would make awful comments about my body, yell at me, threaten me, and wouldn’t respect anytime I ever said no and force me to do something or go somewhere I didn’t want to. It felt pretty abusive really. My self respect completely diminished by the end of high school. I am no longer friends with her because I slowly distanced myself during senior year and after high school.

It has been hard for me to make close friends in college because I am scared the friendship will turn out just like the one described above. I have gained some of my self respect and communication skills back. However, I still have poor communication skills because I am scared that if I express my feelings, it will turn into an explosive argument full of screaming, threatening and yelling. Maybe I just need to stop making friends with bitches with anger issues. But when I find out a new friend has anger issues, I usually don’t know how to deal with it. I feel like any confrontation, boundary or argument will end in explosion. And often, this situation happens when I meet a new friend group, and I feel trapped because I feel like I have to leave the friend group if I don’t want to hang out with that particular person.

Sometimes I feel like I don’t have it in me to be assertive, confrontational or mean in any way. I am usually calm, and when faced with disrespect from a friend, i usually just distance myself without telling them why. I wish I wasn’t like this. I have hurt and dumped friends by quietly distancing myself and I would at least like to explain (or angrily tell them off) why I don’t want to be friends with them anymore. I have heard online of people cutting off friends “silently” but I think that is wrong. You should at least let the friend know what you don’t like about the friendship (or them) so they would at least have an idea why the friendship ended when you leave.

Do you relate? Any advice?

Hey, I am 20F and I have been a chronic people pleaser. I recently learned that I am way too nice to people who don’t deserve it. I give deep compassion, respect, and empathy to people who don’t return it back to me. This is mostly because of my past of having a narcissistic dad and toxic friendships with people with anger issues. I have been in a struggle with making friends in college and battling my own mental health struggles. I feel pretty lonely and I get deeply attached to people because I have been socially isolated for so long.

Anyways, how do I stop being so nice? I want to be mean sometimes and express my true feelings but I feel like that will just turn into some physical altercation in the end. I feel like I overthink these types of situations because I haven’t stood up for myself in so long. I used to have lots of courage. I could go toe to toe with a 6’5 man and wouldn’t blink an eye. But now I feel that I am too small and skinny (5’2 and 110 lbs) to be able to do that. I would get my ass beaten and humiliated. I let people physically intimidate me.

Any help?

I am 20F and I have daddy issues. My dad is a narcissist and had been pretty emotionally unavailable my whole life. This led me to a weird obsession with sexuality when I was younger (like 15/16/17). I liked to turn every conversation into sex, I loved the idea of being admired sexually (even by people I found unattractive), I liked to buy sex toys (and even talk about and show it to other people), and have sex with random people my age. I was a weirdo and a creep. People in my school and even family thought so too.

I had been working on myself lately and I have been trying to dive deep into why I did the things I did. I always thought I just had a strange sense of humor or something but now I finally realize how somebody would have perceived me back in my teenage years. I have improved my social skills and self astronomically since then. I am so deeply embarrassed that I am genuinely thinking that I should run away from everyone and go no contact with family. The amount of shame I feel is indescribable…

You know that part in Obsession (spoiler btw) when Nikki comes back to her senses at the end and realize what she had done to herself and everyone around her? That’s how I feel like right now. I feel terrible shame that I let unattractive weirdos touch me and let them convince me to have sex with them even if I didn’t want to. You would think I had been molested as a child, right? But I have absolutely no memory or suspicion of that happening. I also feel gross for creeping out and making people uncomfortable with my “jokes”, showing something they didn’t really want to see, or coming on to them. I have permanently damaged myself and I now I have a new found hatred for my own sexuality. I can read the room and people’s emotions now, but I will never mention anything sexual again (not even in a joking/funny context). I will probably dress more modest now because I don’t want anyone to perceive me as or used as a sex doll anymore.

I wish that I had just been normal. I am paralyzed by the shame and I hope no one from high school remembers me or the uncomfortableness I caused. I hope family forgives me for making strange jokes and going out and having sex with strangers. My one question is how do you deal with the shame and embarrassment of realizing that you did something wrong (like this) in the past?

*btw, dont pm me if you are looking for anything sexual. I will not give it to you.

Hey, I am 20F and I have struggled with being a people pleaser. I am growing out of it but I still feel guilty when people just don’t like me. I wouldn’t say I necessarily do anything terrible but sometimes I can unintentionally do things that are annoying. I noticed that some strangers/people I don’t really know just don’t like me. It might be that I am doing something annoying but it also might be they don’t like me for something I can’t control.

How do I deal with this?

Hi, I am 20F and I grew up with a narcissistic father. Thank god my parents divorced when I was 7 and I primarily lived with my mom but I still had to see my dad every other weekend. I locked myself in my room at his house because I would just be met with some sort of angry outburst, manipulation or criticism. Now that I am in college, I see him even less but I still have to go to lunch with him every now and then because he pays for my college. I reckon I could cut him off and just take out a loan for school but I really just want to survive my bachelors without being in debt (I’ll do it as a last resort or if he really pisses me off).

However, I still have the lingering effects of terrible self-hatred, social isolation, massive guilt when getting confronted or standing up for myself and people pleasing for friends who treat me like shit. Even though, I do have respect from my boyfriend, I feel like I tend to beg for romantic male attention (this used to be a worse problem). I feel like I have no respect for myself, others don’t respect me and I don’t know who I am. I am also very anxious and I suffer from insomnia. I thought PTSD was only for war veterans but I am beginning to think I have CPTSD after looking up symptoms of narcissistic abuse. I’ve always overlooked how serious this trauma was but I’ve recently noticed that I do not live a normal happy life because of it.

I have extremely low self worth and I am often drawn to others who treat me poorly. I often can’t trust myself when it comes to social situations because I figure that I’ll say something stupid or weird. I am avoidant on friendships and I often grow resentful and push them away. I feel very scared when someone intimidates me (yells at me, criticizes me, etc.), and I often feel so confused on what to do that I end up not doing anything. I am very angry and resentful and I live my life out of fear. I feel like everyone in college is living their best life but I am very fearful of friendships (and honestly people in general).

I hate my life. How do I fix this? Therapy is pretty expensive right about now. I’ll save up for it but any advice before I have access to it?

Hi, I am 20F and I have this weird thing where I cannot get over some things that happened in high school. I think it is really weird because I definitely did not peak and I was definitely not a good time in my life. I can’t get over people who were really mean to me, misunderstood me, or did not like me. This time of my life felt traumatic, and I feel like a loser for always thinking about these people. In high school, my social skills were not the best at all and I weirded people out, and I was made fun of a lot.

I think this problem is very strange because it is only about high school. I am in college and I don’t think twice about the people who were kinda shitty to me at uni (even if they were my friend). But in high school? I always replay the situation and wish I could travel back in time and responded in a different way.

I think maybe it is because I see it as proof that I am an unlikeable, weird loser (which I was back then) who deserves to get bullied. Thankfully now, my social skills have massively improved, but I don’t have any proof yet that I am more likable, respected and less weird than before. I haven’t made friends in uni yet because I have been trying to improve my mental health and social skills for two years. I am ready to make new friends but I am not sure if they will see me as that same weird loser from high school.

I don’t know, I feel like I am in the same boat with losers that peaked in high school when it comes to thinking back to that time. How do I fix this? I just want to live my life normally without thinking about these people.

Hi, I am 20F and I feel like I am a complete weirdo. I often think that my humor can be pretty offensive and inappropriate, so this tends to weird people out. I am also always working on my social skills so I also might come off as weird or awkward when I do not mean to. My whole life, I have struggled socially and I have dealt with people calling me weird. I have said/done a lot of things that have weirded people out. In high school, I wasn’t very liked because I made some people uncomfortable with my weirdness (and sometimes creepiness). I am so embarrassed of my past decisions, and the shame eats me away.

Even though I have gotten a lot better at my social skills, I still feel that I need to mask my true personality so I do not make people uncomfortable. I feel like it is so hard to have deep friendships now because I do not want to reveal that side of me. Even though that side of me has toned down, I am done with being labeled as “the weird friend”. I hate not being able to connect to people of a deeper level, I do not want to be this way but I am so scared.
(Side note*) I have suspected I have autism but I found that I do not show any other more revealing signs of it (and even being aware of it would not help me that much). I have also gotten tested when I was younger and they said I do not have it.

I hate having to hide myself, it is exhausting. Have any of you felt this way? How do I get over this?