r/mentalhealth

My girlfriend and I have been together for seven years. Most of the time she is intelligent, ambitious, caring and completely normal with me. She is a high achiever who has worked extremely hard, but she carries a lot of disappointment and resentment about her life. She feels that despite deserving and working for better things, she hasn't received the opportunities, recognition or stability she expected. Her family also body-shames her and often fails to recognize her efforts. She is living abroad and feels very alone.

Our relationship has become another source of disappointment. I promised her years ago that I would become settled and financially stable so we could build our future together. I moved abroad for my master's three years ago but still haven't secured the stable full-time job I expected. She feels betrayed by this and worries that she has spent seven years waiting for a future that isn't happening. She also felt deeply unsupported when her friends repeatedly mocked her about our relationship and I didn't defend her enough. I recognize these failures and don't want to portray myself as a perfect boyfriend.

The problem is that roughly every couple of months, she has an extreme episode. She screams and curses at me, calls me ugly, poor and a failure, says I don't deserve her, says she hates me and my family and blames us for her unhappiness. She says she wants to break up but doesn't actually leave. When extremely angry, she throws or breaks things. Sometimes she scratches herself when overwhelmed.

I initially try to stay calm, reassure her or explain myself, but the shouting can continue until I eventually break down and shout back. I know shouting back isn't healthy and take responsibility for it.

The confusing part is what happens afterward. Once the episode passes, she becomes completely normal again. She recognizes that she went too far, genuinely apologizes and regrets hurting me. We communicate normally and can be very happy together. But despite her apologies, the cycle has continued for years.

That's why I struggle to simply see her as a horrible or abusive person. I see someone carrying enormous loneliness, anger, disappointment and insecurity who seems unable to control herself once she becomes overwhelmed. At the same time, I realize that understanding why someone behaves this way doesn't mean I should accept being repeatedly degraded or having things broken around me.

I don't want to diagnose her, but I'm wondering whether this could be severe emotional dysregulation or something that requires professional help. Because self-harm is involved, I think she needs professional support. She recognizes that her behaviour is wrong when she's calm, which makes me wonder whether therapy could actually help her break this cycle.

I love her and seven years together makes walking away extremely difficult. But I'm also scared that marriage, financial problems, children or other future stresses could make this much worse if nothing changes.

Has anyone experienced this either as the person having these episodes or as their partner? Did therapy actually help? How do I support her without becoming responsible for managing her emotions?

I want to be normal, I want a respectable career, but every good university course is in a city I can't afford and would not really be allowed to move to, and regardless, I was fucking stupid at sixth form and all my A-Levels are in History, Art, Literature. Not ONE Science. I'm fucked now, I can't get a job, I have no friends, I wish I could go back in time and beat myself over the head and force myself to be fucking normal instead of an unlikeable subhuman nerd. I hate that I fucking HAD MY CHANCE, when you're at school all you have to do is try and study and I couldn't even manage that. Now all my peers are well liked and getting into good careers and I'm about to go on benefits like those autistic losers in the lowest classes, like nothing in my life has ever mattered at all, I could never have gone to school at all and dropped out like my friends and ended up the same. I need some kind of STEM qualification. If not for the job, then just the CHANCE to get in with the right people. I'm tired of constantly being associated with gays and transsexuals and goths and autists publicly. I'm tired of being seen as subhuman. I want to be real. I want to be loved. I want to be respected and well-spoken and seen as a human being. I want society to respect me. I want the world to see me and never THINK of calling me lesbian or autistic or transgender or emo ever again. I want men to respect me. and want me. I want women to see me as one of them. I want to know the right people no matter how much I have to lie about myself to do it. Even if I deserve to be treated like a dog, I'm selfish, and I want the normal high life.

18 F here. im in uni and im struggling so bad right now. i cant focus on my studies and i got a major exam next month. ive been struggling with depression since years but now its got sm worse and ive been crying almost every single day. i love being with people and during then ill keep all my sorrows away but bottling up my emotions have been such a great struggle for me.

im planning to end my life cause theres just too much going on like i cant express it all but i really wish i could js tell someone everything. ive been cutting myself since 6th grade and stopped for a while but now im back at it.

theres no one at home and im in dormitory so i cant even visit my hometown when i have holidays. my family is very broken, messy and they dont really care about my emotions. i dont wanna live like this i want to escape from this hell. i keep visualizing my death cause rn i think thats the only end option i got. pls help me out.

I don't know why this word hurts this bad but it does. It's somehow dehumanizing and makes me feel like we're not normal when mental health issues are common. I told people around multiple times to not use that word but they just don't get it.

Using this content warning because it felt the most appropriate, but it doesn't fully apply. Today my sister said that she had weird dreams. Then she told me they were incestuous. I'm so fucking grossed out. Why the fuck would you tell me that? Why do I need to know? I'm not your therapist. I feel so uncomfortable and I wish she didn't tell me. It made me anxious and so angry to hear that, and now I can't sleep. I have OCD and tend to ruminate on things that disturb me most, so I find it vile that she felt the need to confide in me. It's making me spiral. She has such a bad fuck idea of boundaries and things that are and aren't normal to tell your family. Yet somehow I feel like if I tell her not to tell me things, I'M the one making it weird. I did tell her that I don't need to know about the dreams though, and to keep it to herself. This is mostly just a vent because I feel so gross right now. Somehow this is the final straw in me deciding I don't want to be her roommate anymore.

it gets too quiet and i think too much

So back in February, I decided to start going to therapy since my friendship of 6 years had ended. I was DEVASTATED since this girl had became part of my daily life and I needed to speak to a professional, I found this older woman who happened to be both a psychologist and psychiatrist and decided to book with her.

On the first meeting, our 1 hour long appointment became 2 hours long. This woman asked me about everything and even doubted the content of the thesis I’m writing (for context, I’m an undergraduate psychology student) and she thought that my thesis had no content and “she could give me advice on how to work on it since she had a phd.” Mind you, no questions regarding my socializing problems an hour into this fuckass conversation. After everything, what topped it off is when she asked me if I was in a relationship. At that time, I was, and I told her about him and one of her first questions was if I had slept with him to which I was honest and said I did. This woman started saying that I “shouldn’t give it out so easily” and that I “knew better” also starting talking about how “hormones are the worst thing that can happen to a woman” and also asked me HOW many times 😭. At that point, I was extremely upset because she also kept bringing up religion and how she understood I was agnostic but I should become spiritually involved. I ended up telling her I felt very comfortable in my sexuality and that I was going to have sex if I felt like it, I also told her I repeatedly mentioned to her I’m not religious and she kept bringing it up and it was making me uncomfortable. She apologized and said that she didn’t mean to offend me and started talking about some other bs I didn’t listen to because I was ready to leave that call.

Has anyone else had a crazy experience with a therapist? I just kept thinking it was anyone else it could have ended up very horrible.

(13F) Last night, I cried myself to sleep. My mental state is not the best at all. I’m trying to deal with my trauma, yet I cope with the worst ways. Coped with porn and masturbation for a while and stopped. Now I’m coping with gore. I didn’t watch it that much yesterday, and I’m going to try to not watch gore today. I understand what’s going on in my mind, but I don’t know how to start healing. My brain is trying to escape from the sexual assault that happened and the online grooming. I have been enduring alone. My family are unapproachable, especially my father. I’m so scared to talk to him. I know that I didn’t deserve any of this, people just have to be evil. I need someone to talk to, someone I can be honest with without them judging me. I hate that I have to find the love and affection outside, unfortunately I feel safer talking with people on the internet rather than my family and friends. People here actually care. Yet I still need to be careful though, not everything is perfect. I don’t have that many friends, I isolated myself from a bunch of them. And I have a little whom I don’t even talk to that much and I’m not planning to. I have a school counselor that I talked to multiple times, but I didn’t speak to her about the intense issues I’m dealing with like gore. Last night was so intense. I think I had a panic attack, I couldn’t breathe and I was shaking. But I didn’t want to cry loudly because I didn’t want anyone to hear me. So I kept holding my breath and suffocating until I finally calmed down. To be honest, that was the best sleep of my life. Everything seemed so peaceful and my face felt cold in the best way.

Keep in mind, English is not my first language, so my writing may not make sense to some, and I've never posted here before. I, (22F), am struggling with finding the will to live. I've been struggling for the past 5 years, and the past 2 years have been worse than ever. I tried reaching out to family/friends, I tried getting professional help, doing everything that was suggested to me, but nothing is helping. I am looking for suggestions and tips and tricks on what and how to ease my mind a bit and actually start doing things that I wanna do. For example, I think about doing things and I just wanna do them, I can do them, but it gets too overwhelming for me to even finish, then I start to get depressed because I didn't get the life I imagine by not finishing what I started. I have a habit of wanting things, but not wanting to work for them. I sort of expect everyone around me to do everything. I don't want to work for what I want, and I am sick and tired of living and thinking this way. I run from all my problems and avoid them. I struggle with my body image too. I am always told so many compliments, but I can't see what others see in me. I don't see my potential, I don't have the will to live. I can't see what's the point in life. I have my family, my brothers and sisters, so many nieces and nephews, aunts, cousins, friends. But even though I have them all, my problems are starting to seem bigger than the love everyone in my life can give me. I feel like a burden and that I'm in the way. I wonder, "Who would I be to everyone if it wasn't for the financial support I give? How can I stop feeling like, if I wasn't here, there'd be one less mouth to feed, one less struggle?" I'm sick of feeling scared about nothing, and everything, all at the same time. I can't do my laundry, wash my dishes, brush my teeth, it's hard for me to take showers, cook and eat food, or keep my room clean. It's so hard for me to live lately, and I feel like I can't keep up with it any longer. I need to know what's the point in life, and to feel like I actually have a purpose. I want to want to live. I wanna learn to heal, and love, and be loved but I don't know how..

im trans (ftm), which is maybe why, but i dont know if it should be this extreme. im really sensitive about my genitals, ive never looked (i have a lot of hair ive never shaved) or touched it in my life except for washing, which resume to scrubbing aggressively for 5 sec and hoping itll be enough. TMI but i tried touching it directly when i was in the mood one day, and almost threw up and started crying. it disgusts me, i hate it. just thinking about having to touch it directly gives me nausea. i dread relationships because im scared my partner wont wait until i feel ready. and even then i dont know if i will ever “feel ready”. because its been like this all my life and i dont know what to do about it. because i dont understand why im like this. ive never experienced sexual assault. it doesnt disgust me at all on other people, just me. and i cant talk about it out loud for some reason either. i feel trapped. its been like this since im a kid, i used to not wash it at all and get UTIs. as a teenager i thought it would get better as an adult. now im 20 and i want to get over it but i dont know how to since it doesnt come from anything i could resolve. i just wish i was normal

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me (18F) and ex (21M) were together for a year. we broke up because the relationship was getting toxic but became on and off for 4 months. this past month, i started to feel like there's a chance that he's willing to fix things up with me officially. but this thursday, i saw a friend of mine storied a picture in a bar and he was caught in the photo, holding another girl. I was more upset because I told him just hours before that I'm having problems regarding family and school. I confronted him about it and he just told me wtf and asked who sent that (zoomed in pic). He also told me that he didn't know what he was doing but clearly he did because he followed back that girl friday morning. On Friday night (7pm), my friends asked him to pick me up for us to talk and for him to drop me home cause I was so wasted/drunk. we talked and he denied that it was him and made petty excuses such as if he don't love me anymore, then why is he picking me up and if he really like that girl, he must be holding her by the waist just like how he's with me. we went to his house because i told him I didn't want to go home and if I could stay for the night. he told me okay and we talked about our situation. he told me he's never gonna commit seriously to me again and he doesn't see me in his future but he kept leading me on for the past few months so I thought we were gonna be something again. after that, i saw his text on his friend sending him the pic and telling him someone sent that pic to me. his friend told him to just deny it and say the person on the photo just looks like him and he actually used that bullshit reason. i can't sleep because I kept on thinking about their picture and he just told me to try and forget it as if he didn't know the trauma I suffered from my ex who also cheated. by 11 pm, his friend called and asked him out to go for a ride (they have bigbikes) then he looked at me straight in the eye and told him he was on the way. I was left alone on the house and before he left, he kissed me and said i love you. I was so upset because we talked about this being our last time together so I wanted to savor the moment but I couldn't speak up. by 2 am, he told me he saw my friend at the bar and I asked him if he was also at the bar and he just said yes. i was so mad that he lied so I told him I left his house at 2 am and i'll walk to get home (10km distance) he saw that and told me to not go anywhere but I was out of the house. I actually went to my friends house instead but he drived til our subdivision and told me where I was because he can't see me walking on the main highway. I just told him to get rest because he didn't have any sleep for 2 days already but still had the energy to go to the bar. he told me he'll pick me up but I just told him to go home and get some sleep. by 3 am, my friend (worker at the bar) told me he went there again. I am so upset and feeling all these emotions because he wasn't even sorry. he know what he's doing is hurting me but still continues to do it. i have a history of mental health problems and this was just on another level. I'm feeling extra suicidal because I want him to regret treating me so shitty. I want his conscience to eat him up. Here I am crashing out and breaking down and he was there partying with other people. he knows this. he knows I'm not doing well but still continued to go out with his friend. any suggestions? how do I make him feel the same way he made me feel.

I really wish I was white sometimes, I know it's wrong but it feels as if my life would be so much easier if i was white. It feels like no one wants black women, especially if their darkskin. Ive been bullied and belittled and stereotyped for my skin so many times and im just so sick of it all. These days ive been too embarrased to even leave my house all because i dont want to be percieved by anyone. Im tired of hating myself but the only way i would be able to fix that is by using bleaching creams and i dont want any sort of kidney failure or skin issue with comes with those creams. Im just so sick of it all and i want it to end.

I'm 28F with 1 child. My marriage has gone thru a rocky situation recently. My husband is unreachable with some (unconfirmed) news of him cheating on me. I am completely dependent (mostly financially) on him. Lost all hope and getting counselling therapy currently.

Today, I woke up feeling numb. And I slept thru in the bathtub. Hoping to drown. When I was almost losing consciousness, I heard my baby (3 months old) cried. I snapped out right away and ran towards him.

Good news. At least I am able to live thru one more day. Hopefully. It keeps on going for days again.

im just curious because like no mentally well person would scratch themselves right , but no acctually mentally unwell person would do it as shallow as I do. am I like larping self harm? how do u know what you feel and how do you know it's real and your not dramatic? how do I become normal?

I’m 28M. My family micromanaged my entire life, killing my social skills and independence. Now, they are doing the exact same thing to my newlywed wife.

The Cycle: My mother demands traditional "people-pleasing" compliance from my educated wife. When we push back, we face extreme emotional blackmail, guilt-tripping, and alliance-building from relatives.

The Trap: When I stand up as a husband, my family weaponizes my past compliance, invalidates my sacrifices, and uses emotional manipulation to force submission.

The Core Problem: I’m trapped in an enmeshed, toxic system where my family believes they own me more than my wife does.

I’m burnt out, financially unstable due to a lack of early life autonomy, and watching my marriage get sabotaged.

Give it to me straight: How do adults successfully detach, set iron-clad boundaries, and protect their marriage from toxic, controlling parents in an Indian setup?

The more you get used to it, the less you miss anyone.

Eventually, solitude just feels the new normal.

Hi, I’m a 30 year old male and right now I’m having a very hard time with a recent breakup. I was ok for the first few days and recently everything is crashing down on me hard. This is the 2nd time we’ve broke up and it really feels like i ruined the 2nd chance i was lucky to get. A lot of my friends don’t tell me anything that really helps, “oh we’ll find you a new girl, or Lets go out this weekends and pick someone new up”. Im not a bad dude or a fuck boy, i don’t like that way of thinking and they don’t really get it. I just want the girl i love back but its not gonna happen cause of something stupid i did.

If anyone wants to lend a ear or talk and hear me out and give me legitimate advice i’d really appreciate it.

Everything seems so hopeless. Whatever I do, the situation never changes. How am I supposed to get through life knowing nothing will ever change. It’s impossible that anything will ever change. How can I do anything in a world that clearly doesn’t want me in it. I want a purpose. I so badly want a home, i want our family, I want stability. I will never be happy. I am useless

As someone who has one, it's not really something fun to experience. People who pretend to have depression or ADHD or bipolar or anything of the sort always seem to enjoy the disorder. It doesn't make any sense to me. Why would you WANT to have a debilitating condition? Never mind the fact that they're creating a whole identity out of their illness. For most people I've seen who have been confirmed to not have the disorder they claim to, they're posting about it all the time in ways that anyone and everyone can see. Do they not have hobbies? Do they not want all of their personal business posted where their friends and work can see? I've posted some too personal shit while hypomanic and after the episode I immediately take it down because it's embarrassing. For the most part I and most others with mental health issues see it as only a small part of our life. I just don't get it. Why fake something and then turn it into your whole personality?

I (20F) been dating this man online since Valentine’s Day, and at first I thought he was super great because he was nice and (don’t shame me) a hot bod. A couple weeks into the relationship he got super toxic and told me to remove all my male friends one snap, TikTok and instagram or else he would leak my nudes to my work and close friends (the ones I still have). There are so many situations on which we have been fighting and he then threatened to send my nudes to my parents or close friends. I really don’t know what to do because I feel like I can’t escape, he knows where I live and where I work bc he tracked my location on my phone.

I’ve been trying to make me appeal unattractive to him, but that hasn’t been working. He’s straining my mental health and I really cant go on for much longer like this. Has anyone been through something like this or can someone help because I don’t have anymore friends or people who see me regularly anymore.

Please help…