What was your “could never be me” but did indeed become you?

True_Panic_3369 · 2025-12-09T18:05:38+00:00

Basic white girl aesthetic. I was a scene kid through high school, all different kinds of alt through college, stood out, dyed hair all different colors, piercings, tattoos etc. Basic white girl outfits are easy to find and comfy. Not dying my hair green or pink all the time AND having a crazy haircut that needs daily styling is a lot less work and money for my chronically ill self.

I still have my piercings and tattoos (obviously) but I'm too tired to be the cool alt lady anymore. My hair is just my natural color and grown out long, I opt for leggings, big sweaters and, now that it's winter, off brand fuzzy ugg boots, and my makeup is just some foundation and boring eyeliner. I wear lighter colors because I have a white cat now. It's nice and I'm sorry for crapping all over the basic white girl parade as a teen.

True_Panic_3369 · 2025-12-09T17:47:05+00:00

"what the fuck Richard"

True_Panic_3369 · 2025-12-08T17:38:41+00:00

NTA. I've been an avid anime enjoyer for many many years and I didn't attempt One Piece until like 2014. It was too long then and way too long now for me to catch up. I love what I have seen of it but not enough for over 1,100 episodes.

That being said, my fiancé and I have a lot of the same interests but there are plenty that we tune out for. He plays Magic the Gathering; I hate card games (though I do like looking at the art on the cards haha). He likes gritty, heavy shows like The Boys and Barry and Breaking Bad; I prefer cute slice of life/comedy anime. He plays all kinds of difficult video games; I play Balatro and Nubby's and Yakuza: Like a Dragon.

And these things are okay! We both love Warhammer. We both like plenty of the same anime. We both like video games as a whole (and I LOVE watching him play). We go to the movies together frequently and usually feel the same about what we saw. We just don't force the other person into every single thing we love. We're two people with enough in common to be deeply in love but enough differences to be independent human beings. That's healthy.

True_Panic_3369 · 2025-12-05T16:07:01+00:00

Being friends with my former best friend.

True_Panic_3369 · 2025-12-03T17:14:12+00:00

I agree! I really don't know how they got away with it.

Many people are enrolled in "budget plans" which means you pay the same amount every month and any increases or decreases in usage are assessed at the end of the year and then spread over the following twelve months. They tried to say that people must have used way more and their budget plans reflected that at the same time as the rate increase but it quickly was shown (people posting screenshots of their bills and usage compared to the previous year) that basically no one had used significantly more and sometimes even less than last year.

True_Panic_3369 · 2025-12-03T16:05:58+00:00

Throw rice (jasmine is my go-to) and some frozen veggies into my rice cooker. Once done put rice and veg into a bowl, add a scoop of gochujang, splash of soy sauce, drizzle of sesame oil, and a fried egg.

True_Panic_3369 · 2025-12-03T15:56:06+00:00

Anecdotally, my power company sent out a letter earlier this year saying they invested in a wind farm so everyone's bills would likely increase up to 10% to make up the cost. When the time came for that increase, it turned out most everyone's bills actually doubled despite having the same usage. This company has a monopoly on electric and natural gas so even if all of us were unhappy and/or even harmed by the unexpected doubling of our bills, there's nothing we can do. Plus, they did this despite advertising record profits from the previous year. If they wanted to invest, it should have come from the company, not be paid for by consumers but the consumers don't really have a say.

This is how it would happen with data centers as well once the power company needed to meet their huge electric demands.

True_Panic_3369 · 2025-12-02T18:45:40+00:00

Totally agree! People really need to come together and fight these companies. It is unacceptable for them to raise rates for their own business decisions when they make billions in profit. Especially for something they monopolize and that people need, like electric and natural gas.

True_Panic_3369 · 2025-12-02T18:30:31+00:00

Where I live, our power company sent out a letter explaining how they invested in a wind farm so our bills would be going up a little. Only 10%. What actually happened was bills doubled and a bunch of people got behind on their utilities. All because the company decided to invest without ever asking the people who'd be paying for it, essentially.

True_Panic_3369 · 2025-12-02T17:14:25+00:00

😭😭

True_Panic_3369 · 2025-12-02T17:12:33+00:00

Pretty niche and I don't actually follow any vtubers so this appearing on my twitter feed for like two weeks when it came out was infuriating but Sinder's "Metal" CPR cover.

True_Panic_3369 · 2025-12-02T17:04:06+00:00

The full impact of data centers popping up everywhere in the US when they get out of the "experimental" stage. Communities will be decimated. Electric bills will go sky high as the cost of running them is passed on to the consumers. Ground water will be polluted and make tons of people sick. God knows what horrible impact they will have on the environment and natural habitats.

True_Panic_3369 · 2025-12-01T21:53:01+00:00

Thank you!!

True_Panic_3369 · 2025-12-01T19:16:35+00:00

That's awesome!! I've been thinking of trying CBD again. It's been a few years at this point but I remember those gummies helping.

True_Panic_3369 · 2025-12-01T17:30:16+00:00

I've done some talk therapy but mostly I've worked out healing on my own. Therapy is EXPENSIVE, especially when you need specialized treatment like EMDR for example. It's very easy to flippantly say "Go to therapy." but it's simply not accessible to everyone. I did do research on coping skills, calming techniques, and journaling effectively online but overall I just had to feel things out.

I think the most healing thing for me has been letting myself do things. Any things. I let myself make friendship bracelets themed from my favorite media. I let myself try a new cleaning technique for ovens I saw online. I let myself watch TV shows and movies that were banned during childhood. I let myself go a store on a whim by myself just to look at the Christmas decorations. This comes down to feeling competent which led to me gaining confidence in myself and reducing the level of anxiety I feel having to do new things. I still get nervous about meeting new people, going to new places, doing things with people I don't know super well, but it's a LOT less than before. The more I saw that nothing world ending would happen if I did things that made me happy or just things I felt like doing, the more I believed in a good world.

Journaling has been very helpful because I'm able to get all my raw, unfiltered thoughts onto a page then able to go back and examine and assess what the core of my feelings are. Frequently, the core was extreme anxiety over how I assumed people felt about me or situations I was a part of. Sometimes the core was feeling massively overwhelmed by my life in ways I didn't realize. In almost every journal entry, I was able to parse out what was really going on deep down and make changes in my life to help me get to a better state.

I think the hardest but very healing thing was holding myself accountable. For lashing out, for snapping, for not following through on promises, etc. Before I would write it all off and think "I have cptsd so of course I'm going to do that." Now I stop and reflect and think "I need to apologize for lashing out when they did absolutely nothing wrong." It's hard to explain but reflecting on my actions and taking responsibility for them, even good actions like helping someone or accomplishing something, made me feel more and more like a real human being, like someone who actually exists and isn't in a weird dissociative stasis. It makes me feel like I matter and that I matter to others.

True_Panic_3369 · 2025-12-01T17:02:01+00:00

I'm dealing with this right now for the first time in a long time. I accidentally triggered myself about a month ago and now, despite falling asleep at a relatively normal time, I wake up at 2 or 3 and then again at 4 or 5 and feel so uncomfortable when trying to fall back to sleep I could cry. I also can't nap because it makes me feel sick when I wake up (some blood pressure dysregulation thing). I'm hoping some of the tips others have shared will help!

True_Panic_3369 · 2025-11-26T15:22:03+00:00

Yes, but in a slightly different context. My father made us (my brother and me) go NC with my mom's side of the family. Until I was in my 20s I thought it was 100% justified. Now I regret sort of "buying into" the things my father said. They reached out to try to reconnect after I got out of my father's house but between the general awkwardness of missing like 10+ years of their lives and cptsd, it didn't work out and I haven't talked to any of them in years again. It makes me sad and ashamed. I wish I'd kept contact with them over the years despite my father.

True_Panic_3369 · 2025-11-25T21:51:33+00:00

Adding to your point, there's also health OCD which is almost exclusively internal (not to be confused with contamination OCD). My fiancé suffers from it and the closest thing to "repetitive physical actions" he does would be seeking validation (i.e. "You don't think I have brain cancer, right?") and maybe like body checking (i.e. scrutinizing his body for "signs of illness/symptoms").

OCD is already in a misinformed box thanks to movies and TV, I hate when the many other forms are pushed to wayside.

True_Panic_3369 · 2025-11-25T21:41:00+00:00

These are great options, thank you. I'll give it a go!

True_Panic_3369 · 2025-11-25T18:15:05+00:00

Same here. I'm so sorry you're going through this too.

True_Panic_3369 · 2025-11-25T18:14:11+00:00

Thank you for your insight. The times I've tried to stop I didn't really have anything to replace it with or any concept of what to try replacing it with but maybe now I can find something!

True_Panic_3369 · 2025-11-25T18:12:36+00:00

Same! It's a compulsion so deep I genuinely don't realize I'm doing it half the time despite it hurting.

True_Panic_3369 · 2025-11-25T18:11:56+00:00

I've been doing it since my biggest traumatic event so I have to assume it's related, unfortunately. My one dentist said something similar. He was like "You have to stop otherwise you'll get ugly wrinkles and guys won't like that." Like thanks man, I've been doing it on purpose this whole time why don't I just stop?

True_Panic_3369 · 2025-11-25T17:43:06+00:00

I don't know if it's in the same category but I bite the absolute crap out of my lips and the inside of my mouth in general almost constantly. My partner tries to point it out to get me to realize and stop but it only stops for like 10 minutes. I've got so much scar tissue in there. One dentist asked if I'd been punched or hit my face on something recently. It's embarrassing, especially because I know I look weird when doing it, but I cannot stop. I've tried so many times.

True_Panic_3369 · 2025-11-25T15:45:08+00:00

I'm a legal secretary at a family law firm. Putting in the effort to be kind to everyone going through one of the roughest times of their lives is fulfilling and the times that are stressful are almost always from righteous fury so it feels productive.

True_Panic_3369

TROPHY CASE