I’m giving up on my friends

Posted on by sophialucia123

I never thought there’d be a time when I would want to give up on friends. I either though I’d fall out with them, or I’d be friends with them for life. That there was not a third option. But when I went to uni, I found myself wanting to give up on friendships.

This started before uni, first with me noticing that it was always me who suggested that we hang out. I would have to say “hey, do you want to hang out after school somewhen” and if I didn’t then we didn’t hang out. Maybe they just forgot, or maybe they were so used to me doing it that they never felt like they needed to. I accepted it and moved on.

But then the same thing happened when people moved to different schools or colleges. I would pretty much always have to message first, otherwise we wouldn’t talk. And I was still having to arrange all the meet ups. If I talked to them about it they’d just say that it’s how they were with everyone and that they’d try and do better but they were so busy. And yet I’d find that two of my friends would be able to arrange a meet up between themselves just fine. I’m perfectly happy for them to hang out without me, but if they can arrange to hang out themselves then why don’t they ever ask me?

So then that leads to the conclusion of that they don’t want to hang with me. Yet any time I talked about it they assured me that they definitely do like me, and when we did hang out it felt like they liked me. So why did I feel like they couldn’t be bothered to make any effort with me? Maybe they do like me, but they care more about their other friends so put their time into them. Maybe it’s because I had a fall out with some of the other friends in the group and even though they agree I was not in the wrong, they don’t want to hang with me as I don’t fit in with the whole group so it’s harder to organise.

I’ve just finished my first term at uni. I’ve come home after two and a half months and no one has messaged me asking to hang out, saying they miss me after not seeing me for so long. When I messaged one of my friends, they said they were busy and would message me back and then just never did. I just don’t feel like I can go on any longer putting in all the effort and constantly nagging my friends to hang out. I feel unwanted and uncared for.

It puts into question me. I feel like there is something wrong with me, something that I am doing that makes people not want to hang out with me. I feel like a bad person, when no one’s told me that I’ve done anything wrong. It’s hurting me, how they ignore me.

Then there’s my friends at uni, I’ve only been there a short while but at uni people care about me. They talk to me, they ask to hang out, they want to spend time with me. At one point, someone I train with in sport messaged me, saying that although they see me in training they would really love to hang with me outside of training. It nearly made me cry with happiness that someone wanted to hang out with me, that they put the effort in to ask me. But for most people this is a common thing, and to me it’s a complete abnormality. It isn’t right, it isn’t fair on me.

So then I give up on them. I’ve tried telling them I don’t feel like they put in any effort but every attempt to tell them has not helped. Should I give them an ultimatum, such as “put in effort or I will no longer be your friend?” or should I just leave it and let us drift slowly apart. But what worries me is that it’s not just one friend, it’s all my friends from home. So when I come home, there will be no one to hang out with. It will make me feel even more alone. I also feel like they don’t deserve to be given up on, but I simply cannot go on like this. Every time I have to put the effort in yet again my self esteem reduces, because I am not worth messaging. Either way I lose and either way it is my fault. And if I do stop being friends with them and then my uni friends turn out to not be who I thought they were, I’ll have no friends and be completely alone. That scares me.

We all need to think about our friends and if we’re the person who is neglecting one of our friends. Maybe it’s time to message that friend who lives far away, or invite someone to hang out with you for an afternoon. I know it can make all the difference to that person’s self esteem and confidence in themselves if someone shows to them they want to meet up and they are interested in being that persons friend. we probably don’t even realise we are ignoring them or not putting in enough effort, but one day they may no longer be your friend and you will have lost them and it’ll be too late. So make a change now, as no matter how busy you are there’s always time to spare five minutes to ask someone how their day has been or to hang with someone in the evening. With new friends I make, I’m going to try and make sure I always put some effort in, and then hopefully they will too.

I don’t have mental health issues and I feel guilty.

Posted on by sophialucia123

A lot of the time we hear people talking about their mental health issues online. But as a uni student surrounded by a lot of people who have these problems, I wanted to talk about my experience and feelings on mental health.

It’s hard to talk about this subject, as I almost feel like I don’t have a right to. Although I have experienced feelings of depression of anxiety, these are fleeting and definitely don’t affect me as severely as they do people who have diagnosed mental health issues. Sometimes when I know people are suffering and they confide in someone else who also struggles with mental health I feel like an outsider. I can’t try and offer my help as what could I do compared to someone who has had the same experiences as them?

It’s also hard because I feel guilty. All these people around me are struggling so badly and yet here I am, fine. I feel like I don’t deserve to be okay, I shouldn’t be this positive or mentally healthy. I can’t be happy that I don’t have a mental illness.

I understand that this is at the fault of my own thinking, and not the fault of people with mental illnesses. It is not them making me feel this way, this is just what I feel. Sometimes when I try to help people by talking to them and being more involved with them, I have then found my mood gets worse and I generally become more negative. I also don’t feel like I’ve helped at all. This again makes me just want to avoid the situation together. But although I have these feelings, I push through them.

I offer my help, I always say I’m here to listen. I never try to offer advice on how to cope with mental illness, the only things I say are if they want to talk to a professional then its always a good idea or that I’m here to support them no matter what.

I hope they know I love them, I hope they know that I want them to be confident in themselves and strong. I also hope they know that I have no expectations of them to be a certain way, or hide it, because I want them to be themselves. Although I have these fears and feelings of guilt, this in no way makes me not want to be around them, because I know that even if I don’t help them I’m still there, showing my support and love for them. That is definitely better than doing nothing.

If anyone feels like they are in the same position as me and wants to talk, please feel free to contact me. Or if you are struggling with mental health issues and want to talk to me about this post or about mental health in general, please let me know. This post was difficult for me to write, but I’m glad that I have written it, I hope you are too.

The year of self control

Posted on by sophialucia123

My old school’s motto always stuck with me. It seems stupid that a school motto should resonate with a student to this extent – usually they are read and remembered but never properly thought about – but this one struck a chord. It was “be the best you can be”.

I have always thought that there is some aspect of our lives that are out of our control; these unexpected events that throw a spanner in the works that is life. But I strongly believe that if you give yourself every opportunity to improve and work towards a goal, then you are giving yourself every advantage in life.

As a business student, the world is competitive. Therefore I must be competitive. This means taking every oppertunity at uni to improve myself, and my skills and my experience. One way I need to improve myself is in self control.

When doing psychology at A level, we learnt that the human psych contains the Id, which wants every impulse to be satisfied immediately. Although I cannot psychoanalyse myself, I do believe I give in to my ID too easily. I eat chocolate whenever I want, I don’t do work, I never get the daily chores done. A lot of people struggle occasionally with these issues, but I find that I’m struggling all the time to be a productive person.

Not only is this not good for my studies as I need to do well but also having no self control reduces my confidence in myself. If I can’t control myself, how am I meant to become a manager and lead other people, or work a job with high autonomy. I don’t trust myself to get the work done.

Therefore my New Years resolution simplifies to one key word: moderation. I know there is nothing wrong with having a bit of chocolate, or stopping studies to watch a program for a short break. It’s when a bit of chocolate becomes three bars or a program becomes a whole series. I need to be confident I can stop when I want to, I can control myself.

Obviously this is a difficult one to measure, so I’m using the subjective measure of emotion. I know if I eat too much or procrastinate, I feel bad about myself at the end of the day. So I need to finish every day feeling happy with what I have done.

For a time frame I understand that New Years resolutions are meant to be for the whole year. But I barely feel like its 2019 and 2020 seems ages away. So for a short term goal I’m going month by month. Right now it’s see if I can make it to the end of January. When and not if I do, I will then extend it to February and then so on.

I have always tried to just eat healthy or just do work but these never last so I’m hoping that moderation will be a sustainable goal for 2019.

Please let me know what your goals are and how they’re going to better you as a person, I would love to be inspired by you.