Broken woman needs rebuilding *cue melodramatic music and sob story*

[Erza Scarlet]

EDIT: Here's my first challenge if you're interested: 

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I was nervous about posting this, I'm quite a closed off person and have only ever revealed this information to my counsellor before, but I guess being anonymous on the internet helps and I used my 20 seconds of courage. I also need to introduce myself otherwise I'll probably won't convince myself to move any further on NF. So anyway...

 

Hi everyone, nice to meet you all. I'm a University student about to enter my final year. I've been a big fan of NF for a long time. I love the philosophy behind it, the articles and the community. I started off with the Beginner's workout and then kinda just improvised from there. I also did Taekwondo in my spare time. However, I've kinda been thrown off... things haven't been easy for me (well life isn't easy for anyone, is it?). 

 

Backstory (I tried putting it in note form to shorten it, but feel free to skip to the TL;DR).

Spoiler

Childhood and adolescence: 
Shy and low self-esteem as a child. Bullied at school, physically and emotionally abused at home (I love my family, though, don’t get me wrong). Depressed child and in adolescence also suffered from anxiety. Moved country for Uni (birth country, but wanted to move back to get rid of horrible childhood memories) – felt like worse mistake ever. Love my course but missed family and my one ever friend. 

 

University:
First year: … bad. Tried typical Uni things like clubbing, but ‘lad culture’ made me shy again. It felt degrading, even though I liked the freedom from sheltered family. Eventually my ‘friends’ who liked doing this abandoned me. Didn’t help depression and esteem. Made other friends, but they don’t like drinking at all. Regretted course, just passed grades. Joined fencing, loved and felt myself. Tried some NFA workouts at gym. Spent summer depressed with family – happiness quickly wore off. BFF was on holiday. I self-harmed, though family (matured?) and no longer abused me. gained 1 stone.

Second year: … everything fell apart. Lived with ‘friends’ from course (perhaps my low esteem – but they seem indifferent and always talk about themselves, not helping me). No longer enjoyed fencing so stopped and devoured junk food to help depression. Diet collapsed. Gained another stone. Went to Uni Dr and diagnosed with major depression and anxiety. Put on anti-depressants and referred to a cheap counsellor. Summer, didn’t go home because afraid of self-harming. Counsellor and anti-depressants helped. Suicidal thoughts only occur in bad spells/cycles of depression now. 

Third year: Starting in a few weeks! Last year (already??). Want to try and sort myself out before graduating – my health, fitness, grades and future. Will be incredibly difficult since it’s going to be my busiest year and of course, my depression and anxiety. But maybe committing to the NF forums will help? 
 

 

TL;DR: Close to suicide, but counselling saved me. Now ready to sort my life out and take care of myself.  Still suffer from depression and anxiety, so it's going to be very hard though. Hopefully committing to NF forums will help. 

 

Now enough of the sob story! Time for the fun things!
 

Nerdy side:

Uni got me into anime! (So addicting, though, hopefully it won’t be too distracting…) That’s what I get for joining Fencing (in my Uni most fencers study science and/or are part of the anime society. Someone should’ve warned me! ). I love Fairy Tail and have chosen Erza as a role model. She’s BADASS and I feel like I relate to her (no, I'm not saying I'm badass ). I wish there was a real Fairy Tail guild, but I doubt we can train our magic no matter how hard we try.  But please no spoilers! I haven't finished the 2014 season yet! (I know, shame on me ). 

 

Fitness goals:

To be Erza Scarlet!  I’ll have to think about this. I’m struggling to pick a guild. Erza would fall under Warrior, but personally I would prefer Assassin or Ranger. I want to be built for travelling/exploring, climbing and martial arts (for fun, but self-defence is handy too).    

 

So there's my backstory and bits of trivia. Despite my mental support, I still wish to commit suicide sometimes. But like my counsellor said, I wouldn't keep coming back to her if a part of me didn't want to get better. This little piece of info has helped me realise that I do want to get better and live a good life. The prospect seems so out of league, almost impossible, especially since I know I'm going to be (subconsciously) sabotaging myself. It also feels like so much, not just my fitness, but my health, goals and life in general. But one baby step at a time I guess... 

 

Anyway, thanks for reading (if you managed to read through my melodramatic - and maybe TMI - post). Looking forward to getting to know you guys.  

[bker1370]

Welcome aboard.  Glad to have you here with us.  anything we can do to help, just give shout.

[Hyrulian Yogi]

Hi there! I read your story and would like to give you a virtual hug. I've struggled with depression, anxiety and lack of self-confidence my whole life and only started getting better last year. I want you to know that it does get better. Counseling helped me a lot and so did finding my passions in life and pouring my all into them. If you ever need to talk, I'm here.

 

Welcome to NF!

[Tyrgal]

Erza ist damn cool! I've watched the first episodes of Fairy Tail and try to find the time to watch the whole thing (but damn, so many episodes...).
See you around

[Erza Scarlet]

5 hours ago, Hyrulian Yogi said:

Hi there! I read your story and would like to give you a virtual hug. I've struggled with depression, anxiety and lack of self-confidence my whole life and only started getting better last year. I want you to know that it does get better. Counseling helped me a lot and so did finding my passions in life and pouring my all into them. If you ever need to talk, I'm here.

 

Welcome to NF!

Thank you, I hope I do get better. I'm glad you are.  

 

31 minutes ago, Tyrgal said:

Erza ist damn cool! I've watched the first episodes of Fairy Tail and try to find the time to watch the whole thing (but damn, so many episodes...).
See you around

I know, I love her!  (If it wasn't obvious already ). Just find a time to binge a couple episodes at a time, they're worth it.  

 

[samzilla]

Hi there! I am new to NF and new to the entire relm of fitness but I am not a stranger to depression and anxiety issues. We have it the worst for social interaction, which sucks since we neeeeeed social interaction. It helps depression to surround yourself with people that you are comfortable with. (surround aka: 2 peeps. lol) 

 

Anyways, I wanted to say hi, give you an internets hug, and let you know that if you ever wanna chat just hit me up. FB would be easiest or e-mail. Sam Moyer on FB. 

[RedStone]

On 8/21/2016 at 10:20 AM, six1 said:

I love Fairy Tail and have chosen Erza as a role model. 

 

Erza FTW! And like any of us, she is not without her armor after all  

 

You're in the right place, we nerds tend to know what it feels like to be anxious and depressed, isolated and on the fringe without a support system. Reaching out to people can be incredibly hard, especially to a group of strangers, but as you may have seen, being supportive is kind of our thing! The only thing you have to do now is keep the courage up and showing up, this is a safe space  

 

The challenge threads are a great place for this, not only because it gives you a place to record your daily thoughts, progress and what have you, but it is also one of the more interactive areas in terms of giving and getting support. Challenges don't have to be anything more than making a small change in your routine, even if it just means posting there everyday... and even though that seems small, incremental changes make a huge difference in the long run! 

 

So who's ready? Let's do this! Hope to see you around  

 

 

[Erza Scarlet]

On 8/31/2016 at 6:49 PM, ~RedStone~ said:

 

Haha Erza kicked Juvia's ass  

 

 

On 8/31/2016 at 6:49 PM, ~RedStone~ said:

You're in the right place, we nerds tend to know what it feels like to be anxious and depressed, isolated and on the fringe without a support system. Reaching out to people can be incredibly hard, especially to a group of strangers, but as you may have seen, being supportive is kind of our thing! The only thing you have to do now is keep the courage up and showing up, this is a safe space  

 

The challenge threads are a great place for this, not only because it gives you a place to record your daily thoughts, progress and what have you, but it is also one of the more interactive areas in terms of giving and getting support. Challenges don't have to be anything more than making a small change in your routine, even if it just means posting there everyday... and even though that seems small, incremental changes make a huge difference in the long run! 

 

So who's ready? Let's do this! Hope to see you around  

Thank you I appreciate it. I'm doing a challenge actually, if you want to see it. I've been up and down on it, like I am with my mental health. Some days my depression and anxiety hit me really hard, which makes it really difficult to my quests. But you're right, little progresses make a big change in the end.