u/frenchetoast

I would love to hear from anyone who has rebuilt their personality and zest for life after experiencing years of anhedonia or depression. If you avoid life for long enough, it is hard to come back from the atrophy that occurs.

I know a part of me wants to live, have new experiences, learn and grow - but I feel like such a shell of a person. I want to make new connections but feel I have nothing to offer because I have spent years failing to take an interest in much of anything, or to actively pursue life. I have nothing to talk about 😭 it is so hard to throw myself at life when doing so throws it into perspective how behind I really am, and I am still experiencing waves of “what’s the point” numbness.

How did u do it?! Thanks for all who reply <3

Ideally a free or one-time expense, but open to hearing suggestions which include a cheap subscription fee.

I need a weekly budgeting app. Most apps are monthly, but I am aware of my recurring monthly expenses - so what I really need is a way to visually keep track of my weekly spending so I can stay on target 😭

All I really need is the ability to categorize and visualize my spending on my weekly limits by entering my expenses. I’d like to hold myself to mini-budgets, like a weekly limit for grocery spending, by seeing a progress bar or something similar for each category. I’d like to be told how much money I have left to spend in each category. If the system refreshes weekly, I’d be fine with that - I just need a tool to use each week to hold myself accountable.

I feel like this is very simple but I can’t find anything out there :-( any help?

Last fall, I was driving a friend’s car while they and another acquaintance were in the back seat. I zoned out, didn’t realize I was going through a construction area with a reduced speed limit, or the fact that I was driving so much faster than the cars in the right lane. I was pulled over and was apparently doing 93 in a 60. We kept on the road and switched drivers at the next possible stop. I had apologized but was rattled and rlly freaked myself out because I’ve never done something like that before. I was pretty quiet afterwards and didn’t know what else to rlly say, I’m kinda at a loss about how and when to have hard convos or check in with ppl emotionally, but rlly in being quiet I think I was minimizing shit and acting like it didn’t happen. It was fucked up in general because I put people’s lives in danger, and it was especially fucked up because the back passenger was black so they were forced to be in a police interaction, even if me and my friend up front were the only ones to talk with him.

My friendship with my friend would go south a month later and blow up after they got paranoid i had poisoned them (which is a little crazy) but i realized they had got so resentful and paranoid of me after multiple instances where they would come to me with something hurtful I’d done, and I would apologize but always immediately explain myself and get kinda defensive. I was being rlly inconsiderate of them in other ways without realizing which didn’t help matters.

Yesterday we were both in another car on the way back and I decided to try driving for a bit. They said something about “as long as you don’t speed” and said I’d been going 93. I rlly thought I’d been doing 80 something so I argued a little but in retrospect they must have been right - but there I had gone, fucking arguing and being defensive again. I feel fucking scummy I’ve never had a relationship go so sour, but I was definitely the toxic one in this friendship.

We work together in the same volunteering group. They eventually realized that I hadn’t poisoned them, but I haven’t been able to act comfortable or warm around them after everything. I see them and freeze up. I don’t talk to them much. I feel like I’m being cold and making the vibes worse and doing myself no favors but idk how to face them thru the shame as I keep seeing them. I feel like I’ve apologized so much to them, including apologizing for apologizing wrong. I’m so in my head, and terrified of fucking something up again because it keeps happening.

How do you escape shame when you have to keep seeing the person you wronged? How do you move forward and act right if you are scared it’ll come off forced or in-genuine, or as if you’re acting like there’s no bad water under the bridge?

Was looking up whether ppl had shared their experiences working through dissociation and came across this resource that may be helpful to ppl

https://www.actmindfully.com.au/upimages/Working\_With\_Dissociation\_-\_Russ\_Harris\_-\_www.ImLearningACT.com.pdf

Lol i wasted the past year depressed, spiraling insane style, isolating and watching all my social ties deteriorate. Turning 27 on friday - spent my 20’s living in my head, avoiding and withdrawing, drifting aimlessly, not learning the social n emotional skills to develop deep friendships or relationships…and all that.

For almost a month I have been pretty consistent with keeping my room and kitchen clean every day. I am trying to build a habit of eating enough each day. I am so scared and so alone and hate myself very much!!! But I feel a growing sense of trust in myself that i can crawl out of the pit and if i just keep crawling a little each day then time is on my side. I wanna learn how to live -_-

Next i wanna do exposure therapy on myself and throw myself into social situations and reach out to ppl i haven’t been seeing or talking to in a long while (nightmare nightmare nightmare). It feels good to have a clean house and to feel like i care enough abt it to do it every day. Pray for me the rough patch after isolating is always so rough fuck…

Quarter life crisis has not stopped yet, turning 27 and I feel like the vague impression of a person. I deal with very avoidant behaviors, and have made my life very small and static. I have seen friends around me shift, change, and come into their own, and I am only feeling more and more stunted. There is a lot of fear in all of this, and a rigidness. It is very difficult to let go, open up, and participate in life - when I can feel beneath the numbness, I ache to be connected to myself, others, and the world, and to really live.

The metaphor that returns again and again is the feeling of watching a world full of life and connection happening outside from behind a window in a house I can't leave.

Has anyone felt similarly and worked on this problem? How do you remember the pain of this way of living, when all these types of shying away come from the urge to escape discomfort by numbing out and avoiding potential pain? It feels almost like being suffocated by something incredibly warm and comforting but this is not living, and I want to stay attuned to the pain of this shit, and the desire for something else.