/ot/ - off-topic

Well I wish I could function in public and wasn't ugly as sin for starters

I wish my body wasn't completey wrecked from growing up obese, I never even had a shot at looking normal

I wish I wasn't so perfect. Life would be so much easier if I gave less of a shit about being the best at everything (and succeeding in this almost all of the time.)

>>143673
Do people expect a lot of you, anon? I know most perfectionists raise people's expectations and are under pressure to be the best.

Anyway, I wish I had normal hair and no matter what I do, I can't get rid of my "pooch" stomach. And I wish I had a sexy voice, not a little girl voice because ffs I'm turning 21 soon.

I wish I hadn't destroyed my arms/thighs/boobs via self harm. They're all covered in ugly scars and I can't really wear anything pretty.
I wish I could get rid of my upper arm flab and stomach fat but no matter what I do I can't seem to get rid of it or tone it flat.
I wish I hadn't destroyed my metabolism with my ED years ago.

I wish I weren't a functioning alcoholic with a sense of responsibility. Everyday is a struggle between being good human and being drunk. Ngl,I choose drunk most of the time.

I have a fat baby face and weak chin, I hate it so much. I also wish I weren't such an awkward fuck.

>>143673
I want to slap you

I wish I wasn't such a fuck-up. I didn't get into uni, I'm losing all my friends, I'm a miserable loser who is posting on lolcow instead of talking to a therapist and literally no one has any faith that I'll follow through or achieve anything

>>143679
This is mostly me, except that I got accepted to a state university a few years ago. I just never went because I'm a fucking idiot that let anxiety psych me out. Now, my life is basically in ruins and I would love to have that chance again…

Relatively long, so please bear with me:
I'm majoring in a field that's useless if you don't have a PhD, so I'm pissed that I signed myself up to waste my 20's in school. I'm only 21 but already have wrinkles around my eyes from studying so much.
I'm also kind of chubby (26 inch waist, 36 inch hips, and 20 inch thighs) and I have a babyface. I wish I was slender and had a more mature looking face.
Finally it seems like I'm a magnet for creepy/asshole/just plain weird guys. I wish someone nice would talk to me for once.

I hate that I put on a facade when I have to talk to other people. The nervousness make me try to look cool or be nice and it's really obvious because my voice jumps an octave and I always make an embarrassment of myself or get forced to be the leader/speaker of a group. Outside of those situations I'm super aloof and hate talking.

And like you OP I wish I was creative because I like art but I'm shit in the originality department.

Why am I so socially retarded? Literally all my problems in life stem from my inability to talk to people.
My family members are all really funny and interesting. The people I grew up around are funny and interesting. Why the hell am I like this?

I'm so painfully awkward and can't come up with shit to say ever. I don't even know if I want friends but I don't think I'd be able to keep a consistent group even if I tried super hard. I'm a huge sperg and I have no creative interests.

I'm probably like, a 5/10 in terms of appearance but I literally have no personality.
I fucking hate it, EVERYONE around me is always having a blast and coming up with witty things to say and having tons of fun conversation and I'm always an outsider. I'm a gigantic party pooper.

I can go on and on forever about it because this kills me inside. I've written like 100 diary entries on this topic over the years since I was 8. There is no way social skills are actually skills. I'm mentally unfit or some shit.

Sometimes I look back on my old facebook posts and images and it feels like I'm looking at a different person. I used to be so cute and quirky. My skin was so bright and youthful. My hair was thick and glossy. I almost don't recognise myself anymore.

The stress of school and depression just ate me from the inside out. I don't even know who I am as a person anymore. Years of therapy got me nowhere.

I used to have little hobbies and people complimented me on my work but now they just exhaust me. Mental illness made me turn on myself and made me feel useless. Now I've got no creative outlet. I got fat too because all that interested me was comfort eating and once you fuck your body up like that it's gone forever.

I just want to go back to who I was. I want to be interesting so I can hold conversations. I want to look that effortlessly cute again (instead of having to cake on makeup just to feel normal), I want to be able to try on stuff in clothes shops and feel comfortable in them. I want to be able to de-stress by going out with friends but I don't have any. I just want to be normal. Fuck this life.

I feel like I have no real self. It's like the real me is just a gaping pit of nothing. I subconsciously take on the interests and mannerisms of people around me. Whenever I talk to someone new, I'll sort of gauge what kind of person they basically are and then alter the way I respond to them so that what I say is what they want to hear and so that my opinion is the same as theirs. It's probably the mirroring aspect of borderline and it really depresses me because I can't remember or think of anything that I like that I discovered on my own, without seeing someone else do it first. i feel even worse whenever someone compliments me because then I feel like a huge fake.
also I have to take four years of grad school so ughhh.

>>143683
You might have a touch of social anxiety, but you're clearly over-thinking this and probably mostly suffer from low self-esteem. People who are truly mentally unfit socially. such as those on the autism spectrum, can't hide it, including in the way they type. You sound like a completely normal person in that regard.

You're also putting outgoing people on a pedestal to assume you're boring and have no personality just because you struggle to talk to people. Just because you can easily talk about anything to anybody doesn't mean that everything that comes out of your mouth is going to be thought-provoking, amazing shit.

Silence makes me anxious, personally, so I always feel the need to fill it with conversation. That being said, I don't always have something interesting to talk about, so I tend to assume I'm boring as well. Honestly, I wish I could just keep my mouth shut sometimes.

I am a complete hermit and I am genuinely okay with it. I hate that I have to force myself to be fake normal to function in society, ie have a job so I can pay rent and health care etc etc etc all bullshit. I'm in school atm and the prospect of graduating and having a job the rest of my life that I have to interact with people in makes me want to hang myself.

>>143687
Same. Having to come to terms with the fact that modern society only values and rewards people who are outgoing and social. Fucking sucks. If it were possible, I'd go seclude myself in the woods and live the hermit life there in peace.

>>143688
I hear ya. The best I can hope for is I find a job I can do from home but seems unlikely. Welp.

>>143670
I hate how I have no real direction in my life. I just keeping taking it everyday. I wish it was practical enough for me to go ahead and start the homestead I've been dreaming of for years now and make my living that way. I'm in college, because I don't want to work awful entry level jobs all my life. I don't know what to go for anymore.

>>143687

Seems totally self-defeating. How can you be sure you wouldn't be capable without trying it first? Social skills take some practice and people aren't generally too concerned over your demeanor the way you might think they are, in my experience anyway. Work on how you relate to people and get any help for social anxiety you may need, if that's the problem. Introverted people can function just fine, it's just about learning to communicate effectively. You don't need to impress everyone you meet with your sociability, in fact, they'll probably see right through that.

Don't despair, you'll be absolutely fine.

>>143686

I think we can all relate to wanting to talk when there's really nothing worth saying, it's almost part of the human condition. I like to practice thinking hard about what i want to say and asking myself if it really needs to be said (i.e. what am i trying to say? why?) and if it's not really important, i don't bother. It might be uncomfortable but you might find that in time your mind actually gets clearer when we don't have the chatter going on all the time, and you find things worthwhile to talk about.

>>143683
Not a very chatty person myself, but I manage. You can start by thinking of it in terms of manipulation, if that's easier. One thing you can do is having imaginary conversation, try to simulate getting someone to laugh. Don't be overly clever, no-one gets those jokes. Try simple mild boundary pushing stuff and retreat back from it.

I've hated my breasts from the moment they started growing. I was a fat kid and I've learnt that can cause early puberty, I was so ashamed of my body already and these sacks of fat just added to the embarrassment. I have chronic back pain and have bad posture from leaning over trying to make them look smaller all these years

oh god where do I begin? I've hated myself for as long as i can remember. having an awful fucking time tonight so I'm venting on the only appropriate thread for me to talk about my sad existence on

I feel like I had so much potential in having a super happy fulfilling life, I was so creative and intelligent, and now… I'm just a painfully unproductive sloth who had to take 5, MAYBE 6 years to graduate. with a fucking visual arts BFA. and no good portfolio or experience to show for it. I chose art because I love it and it;s all I'm decent at and I literally haven't produced anything in my own free time in a good year and all my skills are probably so shitty and subpar now, looking back at my high school work I don't know what made me continue to pursue art when all my contemporaries were MILES ahead.

I feel like a real life version of lolcows that don't know how to photoshop, bc i literally look so different between candids and flattering selfies and every angle makes me look like a different person and idk if it's my body dysmorphia talking but i don't even know what I actually LOOK like

sometimes I feel like i have a v cute flattering body type, but I would trade my small waist in a HEARTBEAT to have even normal or relatively small arms, anything but these fucking lunchlady man arms that are so disproportionate to the rest of my features that literally won't disappear they were big even at my lowest weight and it doesn't make hating how I look much easier

i'm the worst friend ever and now I have about 2-4 people I can realistically consider good friends now that the rest have given up trying to hang out over the years, social anxiety makes me dread casual human interaction and i can't fuckin go outside without at least one paranoid thought that people are judging me

i'm a literally baby and got my first (minimum wage restaurant chain) job at age fucking 21 and I STILL CAN'T FUCKING DRIVE and every time I think about it i wanna have a panic attack over how useless i am that i can't even get a fucking license

ruining my teeth, metabolism and entire body with on and off for a decade eating disorder that i somehow hide from my BF who lives with me and everyone else in my life who has ever cared, and it's just this big huge monster and I cling onto it just because i'm like a "functioning" bulimic and i look healthy. it helps me stay at a weight I don't loathe myself at/ I can stay relatively thin for no effort. but i might die from some terrifying health complication, for the most shallow fucking reasons, and I'm simultaneously so self aware of how bad it is and also really amazing at pretending I don't even have a problem/ "this is the last time/ I can quit whenever I want". GOD it's the most embarrassing shit ever

tl;dr my whole life is like one big wine stain on a white couch that you flip over to the other side so that no one notices

like my problems are fucking lolcow snowflake problems except i'm like self-aware of how embarrassing i am but i can't seem to do anything to change it????

>>143695
>my whole life is like one big wine stain on a white couch that you flip over to the other side so that no one notices

this speaks to me

>>143690
What about studying ag, or something else that would be useful for homesteading? Dude, don't give up on your dreams. You can find a way anon!

>>143695
We're a bit similar anon, I wish arts majors weeded out people with low self esteem or stamina issues so we could have quit whilst we were ahead. I keep clinging to this idea that I'm an artist but I'm nearly 30 and still terrible. I have nothing against older artists but even when I'm 50 I will still be awful. I wish I was inspired by property development or something instead.
By the way do your elbows bend backwards naturally? Mine do and I think it makes them look even more fat. It felt sort of nice to realise.

>>143698
>>143698
I feel pretty much the same except like… I definitely used to be at least a little talented and creative, and once college happened idk where the fuck it all went. it comes and goes and sometimes I'll actually make somewhat ok things, but lately anything I paint I instantly despise. I KNOW that if I had an iota of motivation or inspiration whatsoever i'd have the potential to do a lot of great things but…. here I am throwing my money away at something i can't even do right

and no i'm not double-jointed whatsoever, but funny you should mention that because I have this huge problem with posture/slouching and i honestly think that half of it is from knowing how slouching my arms forward makes them look smaller from the side and just continuing to do it for years and years

>>143699
>>143698
>>143695
Fuck I know how you guys feel. Except that I quit while I was ahead and I'm not buried in debt. I guess I wasn't taking art seriously enough even tho it is my only talent, and Ive heard too many horror stories about art students and getting no job after their degree. I don't know if it's just me but society pretty much looks down on you when you even tell anyone you have a degree in art. It's like they expect you to be low achievers- in my experience no one has ever been impressed with a fine arts or masters degree.
As of now I'm also pretty much in the same boat as everyone else here, just lost, sad and trying to figure out what to do with my life. its depressing as hell because you get in that vpaid cyclle of blaming and comparing yourself. I'm trying my best to climb out of the hell hole and pursue the rest of my time in the medical field. As for the other annons out there I wish you guys the best and hope you guys find something thatll make life much better

I'm slipping slowly into a deep dark depressive pit after the guy I was dating got sort of involved with his ex (not romantically just something happened in her family and he gave her support) and now he wont reply to me or give me a straight answer. I've picked up smoking and I have basically no future.

Boyfriend was talking about his future plans to someone and didn't mention me once. I want to tell him this hurt me, but i'm probably just being a little bitch and over thinking things.

Working at a dead end job for five years now. I just want to leave and make a living with my dream job which is a freelance artist. I hate my day job with a passion and want to quit, but gotta pay rent.

I feel like everyone around me is having a better time then I am. I just…wish I could take a month vacation from everything and focus on myself.

I feel like a failure and a loser. Couldn't even pass a simple algebra class in college, so I feel fucking stupid. I cannot for the life of me focus/concentrate on basic activities. Someone will tell me something and not 10 seconds later Ill literally forget what they said. I can't even interact will people in a 'normal' way.

I wish I tried harder in high school. Maybe my life would be better then it is right now.

>>143701
I know how you feel. My ex still lived with his girlfriend. I was fine with it because "he chose me!!" and "she has nowhere to go"

A couple months in he slowly starts spending less and less time with me. He dumps me after I get angry at her.

Later, things have cooled down somewhat… Untill he mentions watching this stupid anime with her that i wanted us to watch together. We fight, and i try and be reasonable. He says he understands my point of view, that he didn't remember I had wanted to watch it with him, ect.

I actually try and befriend his ex at one point and he's thrilled. We end up sleeping together… I just remember thinking if I was perfect enough, he would want me.

Litteraly 5 fucking minutes after he says that he still wants to sleep with her. I'm devastated. Im still devastated.

I hate how fucking fat and stupid and pathetic I am. I've started self-harming again, I just don't give a shit. I hate how much I wish he would want me. I hate how this happened months ago and i just can't fucking get over it. I feel so goddamn pathetic. He was the only fucking person who really understood me. I try to be strong and not show him but I'm still just… Hurting so fucking much.

>>143702
Have you gotten tested for ADD?

>>143700
Haha, being a prehealth is death. I've done well in college so far but this year I'm taking organic chemistry and physics and for some fucking reason I just don't get physics very well. Like I got pretty decent grades in calculus even though I hated the class and just wanted to be out of there. It doesn't help that my professor isn't so great and doesn't go over any problems in class and also that we have online hw that's due like every other day. I just feel really stressed and overwhelmed and I've been binging and purging again because i feel like I'm on the verge of a fucking breakdown or something. Maybe I'm just way too fucking stupid to be a STEM major.

>>143705
It's tough but at least you chose a reasonable major that can branch out into other things, and you definitely aren't stupid if you made it this far. Just hang in there, and it should come out useful later on. Have you considered possibly interning? Im currently being trained right now for medical billing and coding, with about barely any medical college experience and I guess it helped me get my foot in the door. You should try and co-mingle with some solo practices unless youre like, aiming to become a nurse. I know its cutting a lot of corners, but it should help with some anxieties and help you get job experience, or if they like you enough you can start working already

>>143704
I haven't but i've been considering. Use to be able to focus on drawing for hours. Lately its been tough.

>>143700
thanks anon! I'm glad you found a path that'll work for you but honestly art is ALL i have that I'm both good at and interested in, and my bf works in the animation industry so technically if I start getting off of my sad ass and putting effort into it I do have real connections in the art community that I could use to my advantage. It's just that I'm still so… not at all confident in my work yet/ need to push myself more to develop a clear, better style. also i've got another year-ish until an arts degree so it'd be even dumber of me to be an art school dropout than it was to pursue the degree in the first place lol

>>143695
Fellow ana-chan here, I empathize a whole fucking lot with you. I'm such a hypocrite with the way I make myself feel like I'm in control and years of disordered eating are gonna be a piece of cake to stop whenever I want, yet the next day I'm back to restricting, binging, whatever the fuck. I just wish I could go back to my middle school self and stop the whole thing from ever happening, I'd kill for a healthy relationship with food, and the worst part is, like you, no one I'm close to knows I've got a problem. In fact they all think I'm this goddamn health guru because vegan and all they ever see me eating are vegetables

>>143702
Holy shit man are you me? Same story here, fucked off from math in high school and now I want to complete it so I can take on university courses in art shit but since I'm a fuckin idiot I can't even complete baby math (basic algebra, equations x-y etc) and I'm sitting here now on the verge of a breakdown cause I had a important test today and I'm pretty sure shat all over it.

I really want to get into drawing again but I just don't have it in me. I need some kind of structure and that's why I thought some uni classes would be a good idea but my total retardation when it comes to math just bites me right in the ass. I've been in an existential crisis for quite some time now and I have no fucking idea what to do with my life. It's like I'm waiting for a miracle.

I hate myself for how much I let other people influence my life.

Dropped out of a degree that could have gotten me a great job and a stable future because of severe depression and suicidal thoughts as a result of a fuckhead that destroyed my confidence for two years.

I've never had a job in my life due to the lack of work experience and education as a result of dropping out, and I left a drop trial in the middle of the second day because some girl made me cry on the job.

I know I need to grow a fucking backbone and get over my anxiety but fuck I wish I could just live in a world where I didn't have to deal with people.

>>143711
*job trial

>>143699
>>143700
What art schools don't like to tell students who walk through the door (because they want your money first and foremost) is just how much time and work goes into making it as a professional artist. Even reaching the notch above complete mediocrity that will at least give you a chance at the entry level grunt jobs will take you several years of regular and thoughtful practice, unless you have really, really good connections to get your foot in the door. Or the goddess of sheer luck smiles down upon you.

It is a fool's dream that art schools in the modern age actually do their job of preparing students to a proficient level. Most of the time, any art student who goes onto finding a job or clients had been going the extra mile to do extra learning and studying on their own outside of school and working on their own side projects. Tuition rates for many art schools today are straight up scams imo, but that's another topic.

It's not good enough to simply be creative relative to your peers, since the tiny sample size of your hometown/city/university is very, very small compared to the giant talent pool available through the internet. Unless you were born a magical genius prodigy, being creative but not having any of the technical skill to execute it won't be enough to coast on. Discipline is so much more valuable in the long run, which people sometimes don't realize when it comes to the arts, since there's still this mysticism surrounding the 'artistic spark' that people like to perpetuate to a fault.

Drawing or producing pieces only when you feel like your muse of inspiration has come for a visit will definitely not get anyone anywhere in a reasonable amount of time.

I'm speaking from an illustrator's point of view, though, and never really dealt with the fine arts side of the art world.

>>143703
fuck this guy, holy shit i'm so mad just reading this.
I know its super hard to absorb this but it seems like it's nothing to do with you and everything to do with him being a douchebag. I understand how it feels to want to be loved by someone who's not giving it though, it takes a long time to recover from but eventually it starts feeling better and you can look back and think "damn, i'm glad i'm not with that person"
wishing you the best, anon.

>>143703
>>143714
Mte. It seems less to do with her looks and more like him getting his ego boosted from fucking two women and it seeming like they're quarreling over him. Some guys dig being manipulators like that and think they're sooooo desirable when women fight over them even if they're stacking the deck for that kind of situation to occur in the first place. So narcissistic.

i wish i wasnt ugly and that i was able to talk to people without drugs/alcohol

>>143713
The same is true for fashion. You have schools who churn out the hopefuls that will never, ever get their dream job, the best they can hope for is retail. Then you have the really good schools, who take in up to a hundred new students a year, but who never graduate more than ten a year, who already have jobs lined up for them when they come out, because they're guaranteed to be only the cream of the crop.

I know only one person like that, and he told me what it's like: years of going only between home and school, working hours everyday, getting real critique from the best teachers every day. Once he literally passed out in class because he was exhausted and a scary teacher was going off at him. Now he's made it, but the other 90% of the students he entered his first year with just slink off into the real world with the knowledge that they didn't make it, and never will.

I'm nearing my mid twenties and have no control over my life. I've lived over sheltered my whole life, but it worsens the older I get.

I've never properly dated a guy because of how strict my family is. My parents still have a say on who I'm allowed to be friends with so hanging out with people near impossible. At my age it's embarrassing to have to explain to people how strict my parents are so I no longer bother interacting with people irl to avoid the trouble. I have no friends.

I've worked for years, but I support my family. I'm rarely allowed to keep the money I make from working so I have no savings. I don't know how to drive and I don't go school.

I hate my fucking life. I feel behind compared to other people my age and younger. I'm a fucking loser that spends my time CONSTANTLY jealous of other people. I want to be able to buy myself nice things, go out with friends, and do other normal things people my age do. Instead I spend whats remaining of my youth depressed and full of self hate.

At the rate I'm going at I'll be stuck working a minimum wage job, alone, and taking care of my parents the rest of my life and when I think of that I know I would be better off killing myself now. I feel like a moron, and I've lost all motivation. I no longer feel cute and stress has been making my skin worsen and my hair fall out.

>>143718
Anon, you need to leave. Just move somewhere else. Send your parents money if you have to, but don't let them control you.

I hate how skinny I am. And i hate that when I say that people think I'm humble bragging or some shit. I'm only 5'3 but I'm about 90 lbs soaking wet. I eat normally and don't do much physical activity, my job is sitting in an office all day and my hobby is watching netflix. I wish i could gain weight. I've tried mass gainer protein shakes or whatever but I can never stay consistent with it and I always feel like it defeats the purpose because I drink it and then feel too full to snack or eat for a while. Or if i drink it after a meal I'm just uncomfortably full for a while. I realize that I'm too skinny so I know that I don't have bdd but sometimes I wonder if i have disordered eating due to ocd or something. Growing up my parents were really strict about snacking and what I could and couldn't eat, basically that I was only allowed to eat things that are of nutritional value, so I tend to have a mental rule against junk food, fast food, frozen stuff etc. Now that I'm on my own I can't really afford to eat anything besides, though, and when friends order a pizza or wanna grab taco bell I say no thanks most of the time and feel like everyone has just silently accepted that I have an ed. But really I just don't care for what most amerifats consider food. For example I'd rather go hungry than eat a mcd cheeseburger. I just cant. Idk. Fml

>>143720
Build muscle with strength training instead of just drinking protein shakes. You're going to look skinny if you don't do any physical exercise and don't eat much. That's true for pretty much anybody. Gain some muscle and you'll look less skinny. You obviously don't have to turn into a body builder but some muscle is good for you.

And gain weight with food you do like, you don't have to skip straight to junk food if it's not something you enjoy. You don't have to buy expensive stuff either. Nuts, dried fruit, yoghurt and milk can help you gain weight without being too much to handle.

You should focus primarily on your health rather than your looks to begin with though. It can take a while to look how you want and I think that's why so many people give up. If you think about the health benefits I find it's more motivational. Plus, not doing much physical activity is pretty bad for you no matter how slim you are (unless you were legit starving), so changing that should be a priority.

>>143720
I had trouble putting on weight and used weight gainer. Specifically the "1340" brand from GNC. That's 1340 calories in one chocolate shake. Most of it is carbs via maltodextrin.

When you gain weight, it is going to feel uncomfortable. You will feel grossly full like you couldn't eat another bite, but that's just your body trying to regulate. You need to go above and beyond what is normal if you want to make a change.

When people diet and lose weight, they feel hungry. When you gain weight, you have to fight against your body's feeling of being sated.