Struggling really badly

Hi I am so sorry you're struggling. It must be really difficult for you being without your usual support. Please keep posting here if you need to, more valuable and helpful members will be online soon :-) 

In the meantime I found this list on crisis helplines on Wiki.

https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_suicide_crisis_lines

Wherever you are, it should be amongst this list somewhere.

I hope this helps and you're feeling supported soon.

Thank you. I emailed Samaritans back and forth for a while but I am still struggling. 

We booked this holiday before everything happened and I think it has turned out to be completely the wrong time. 

I'm glad Samaritans are supporting you through this.

I'm sorry the holiday was the wrong time for you. Stay safe and keep seeking support when you need to.

I'm glad Samaritans are supporting you through this.

I'm sorry the holiday was the wrong time for you. Stay safe and keep seeking support when you need to.

That's very kind of you to say, thank you.

I think it would be much easier to ignore those things if it was a small number of people. As it happens, there's hundreds and a lot of them have big profiles. The person who shared them initially has 15k followers or something - they could have put my phone number on there, asked people to send me abuse on the basis of me being all the things I've been called (nonce, predator, abuser etc) and people will do it. And they'll be the hero.

I've tried to rationalise it. I do understand why people were angry (and probably still are). I understand why they were so venomous towards me. I had no issue with the people close to me calling me out - when hundreds more pile in, you don't really learn anything. It doesn't make me feel better even though I understand why people responded like they did. I still wish it was handled in a more professional way.

Life doesn't prepare you for that sort of thing. I reacted in a way initially that made it worse (I asked people to report the screenshots and I wasn't taking full responsibility) and *those* messages were also put onto Twitter. I made a statement but I got torn to shreds even more but after my initial handling, I'm not too surprised. It was damned if I do, damned if I don't. If I didn't say anything, I'm not taking accountability - after I did, I was supposedly not remorseful.

There's a bit of demand avoidance too. It didn't matter how right the total strangers were when they'd tell me to "get help" and "do better" and "stay away from women" - my mind is like "who are you to tell me what to do? You have no idea who I am" but I guess social media gives people that freedom.

I don't know who to trust now, because I can't be worrying that everything I say in private will be blasted online (even though I have learnt to respect the other person's boundaries).

I look at my school experience differently now. I got bullied but it didn't impact me this badly, and I knew it wasn't my fault. It has ironically made it easier for me to leave that behind. 

I hope I can hit the ground running when I get back in terms of keeping myself busy but it's all feeling one step forward, two steps back. 

I am so sorry people have treated you this way and said such horrible things. It says a lot about them if they are doing things like that and I wouldn’t waste too much time worrying about what people like that think about you. Especially as that’s not true! Everyone here seems to like you and I like you as well. You’re an honest good person. You shouldn’t have to be feeling like this because of a mistake. It’s not fair that people are making you feel like this. Definitely DO avoid reading their comments... that will only keep you low. I know it hurts being treated like that but honestly those people are not worth your time and sadness. You deserve to be supported, despite what other people think. And you do deserve to be forgiven and forgive yourself.

I hope things will be better for you when you’re back home. The good news is if you’re at rock bottom now then the only way for you is back UP again. It will happen. Maybe not today, or tomorrow, but soon. So hold on to that thought.

And please don’t let people online upset you and make you feel bad. You know yourself better than anybody else does. Mistakes have been made and if they can’t let it go and just keep judging, then that’s sadly their loss. Don’t let that ruin your life.

The way I look at it is, we all make mistakes and very often life forces us in to these mistakes. When I was a kid I had to change schools because a girl set fire to my first one. At first I was really sad and angry, proper hated her but then I thought actually she must have a pretty bad life and be hurting inside to do something like that. And I forgave her. It later turned out she’d been going through a lot of bad stuff and I felt sorry for her and glad that I forgave. Not everyone understands and forgives, but I think people should.

Maybe we’re in the minority? But I think at least that shows we’re nice people ^^

Things will get better. It doesn't rain forever :) 

I wish others were more forgiving. I know I can't rely on other people's forgiveness but it would probably make me feel a little better knowing that someone believes in me. A lot of people on the supposedly progressive side would make the argument that "people never change" no matter how hard I try and show it, but it would be ludicrous to suggest I'm the exact same person as I was before all of this happened.

I used to do a lot of negative self-talk - "I'm a disgrace", "I'm a waste of space", "I'll never make something of my life". When this happened, all of that was validated. I guess it became a self fulfilling prophecy?

There's been a bit of "I'm an evil human being" every time I think of what happened but I don't even have the energy to make myself think that every day, which probably says a lot. I've hit rock bottom and it can't get worse.

I don't want to spend the rest of my life afraid of an online mob who would start a riot if they found out something nice happened to me - or I was visible on the internet as myself again. Right now though I have no protection against that and I almost want to keep punishing myself because I don't feel strong enough to fight against the people who would try and make me feel worse than I already do. They'll be wanting me to suffer and it's like I want to go "will you only be happy once I'm dead?" because that's honestly how it feels.

It's my own fault for reading some of the comments - being called a narcissist and someone suggesting I've been making up the fact I'm autistic are among the low points. I just avoid reading anything about me now.

Maybe things will feel better when I'm back in the UK.

Well with my own life I never forgive myself 100%. I often forgive myself but not completely, I don’t feel able to do that but it helps to acknowledge what I’ve done and then forgive me a little for it but the rest of the guilt I feel I use to remind myself and help me push harder to better myself and not repeat the mistakes again. I find this works for me. It might work for you too if you try doing this.

What you need to remember is you are only human. You make mistakes, what’s done is done and it happens to everyone. What you’ve done, it’s happened and that’s ok, so long as you learn and improve. It’s one of those less fun parts of life but it’s an experience and you’ve already said you want to do better. That’s good. You’ve learnt from this, an important life lesson. The fact you feel bad says a lot about you. It shows you’re not a bad person. You care, you feel bad and you want to do better. That’s admirable.

Don’t be too hard on yourself. You don’t deserve the pain you’re putting yourself through. You can’t change the past and you shouldn’t focus on what’s happened because it interferes and stops you from doing things in the present.

Learn, improve and be better. That’s all you can do really. Life should be enjoyed and you shouldn’t live in the past. You’ll get back on your feet and make friends. Forgive yourself as much as you can and then move on. You’ll always have a support network here :)

It's easy for me to say "I won't do it again and I'll be more mindful of boundaries" - that sort of forgiveness I can work towards. Having taken the people who actually liked me for granted is a lot harder to forgive myself for. I had what I wanted for many years and I threw it away.

Doesn't matter if I intended to or not but I half wonder if it was some kind of subconscious self destruction. It felt so weird having friends that I was constantly looking for reasons that they'd decide to cut me off instead of just appreciating it. I thought it'd mean I'm more mentally prepared for if it did happen but now I realise that I absolutely didn't want that.

I wish I could just cry. I could release a little tear if I watch a sad video or talk about it in therapy but I can't properly release all this pent-up emotion.

I'm at that stage of my life where it's almost becoming too much effort to mask, although it actually feels less safe to unmask in a way. That said, I've started wearing my sunflower lanyard out and about and I think I'll continue to - nothing to lose at this point.

I don't want to feel like this forever. I want to have a support network again and actually do it properly this time - essentially streamline my life so I'm not ruining it for everyone.

I'm so sorry you're feeling like this.

You can be sad no matter who's doing it is.

It sounds like you're being hard on yourself. What might help you get through this and feel better is forgiving yourself and allowing yourself to feel the emotions you need to feel.

As crazy as it sounds sometimes feeling sad can help you feel better, like when you need to cry.

HMO said:

I'll utilise this forum where I can though. 

Definitely do this when you can.

I've only been here a few days and it's my go to site.

It's harder because it's a real life situation where people have been affected. I say real life, it imploded online, but these are people who I have met in person.

I spent a month feeling like I shouldn't be sad about it because it was my doing but that didn't make me feel better.

I wish I knew how to fix it. That's the main thing on my mind.

I'll utilise this forum where I can though. 

Aw I'm sorry about that. I hoped there would be some useful ones there.

If you're on your own or feeling you need support and a listening ear come to the forum at those times. 

When I'm feeling a bit low that's what I do and it brightens me up.

There's a lot of support and love here so I think it might help you to be here when times are hard.

It didn't diffuse the situation enough but that's not their fault.

In any other circumstances I might have managed 9 weeks without therapy (completely out of the control of both parties) fine, but right now I feel exposed and lost. I don't think I was ready to be left on my own.

I'm not sure if I can reach some of those other services given I'm not actually currently in the UK and most of them are text services.