Hello

[Anon1989]

Hello everyone. I just started out with Nerd Fitness today. The Academy to be specific. One of the first tasks there is to write out your reason for joining and then share it with someone. Since I don't have anybody I'm comfortable talking with about this kind of thing, I was hoping I could post it here:

 

"Throughout my entire life, I’ve struggled with weight and self-esteem issues. For as long as I can remember, I’ve never really liked myself or felt comfortable around most other people. But when I left the Navy two years ago, things began to take an even worse turn. I let myself go far more than I had ever intended. Since then, I’ve gained around 60 pounds and lost a fair amount of muscle. This, in turn, has led to depression, social anxiety, and alcoholism. Both my physical and mental health appear to slowly be deteriorating. I’ve developed a deep hatred for myself and can barely stand to go outside anymore for fear that people will see the shell of a man that I’ve become. Needless to say, going to work is a nightmare. Even just writing this small paragraph is taking a toll on me. Before pen had even hit paper, I began sobbing for the first time since I was a child. If I can’t turn things around, I’m not sure I’ll make it another ten years."

 

Hopefully, this is the right place for this to go. Sorry if it's not. I know it sounds pretty bad, but I'm actually quite hopeful about the future. I really believe that this place can help me get back on track and reach my goals. Thanks for taking the time to read this and good luck with your own fitness journey.

 

[Sylvaa]

9 minutes ago, Anon1989 said:

Hopefully, this is the right place for this to go. Sorry if it's not. I know it sounds pretty bad, but I'm actually quite hopeful about the future. I really believe that this place can help me get back on track and reach my goals. Thanks for taking the time to read this and good luck with your own fitness journey.

 

This is 100% the right place to go! Welcome and thanks for sharing what you are going through. It's really hard to talk to people, even over the internet, so way to be brave enough to do so.

 

You'll find that while this is all NF, not everyone on the forums is a NFA member and not every NFA member is on the forums. You'll also find that no matter what you'll find a really open group of people to talk to. If you have any questions, please reach out! 

[Guzzi]

Well done for saying all that, it takes guts even to post on a fairly anonymous forum, so I can only imagine how difficult it would be to speak to anyone about it IRL.  There are a lot of people on here who suffer from depression, anxiety and other mental health issues, so you’re not alone.  There used to be a support thread for people affected by the “black dog”, I don’t know if it’s still active or not, but it would be worth looking for it. 

 

The one one thing I will say is to speak to your doctor if you haven’t already.  I know this might be something that you don’t feel you can face right now, but you need to get help in dealing with this as it’s incredibly difficult to deal with without help and support, something that you don’t seem to have at the moment. If you can’t face talking to your doc face to face, then consider writing it down (or printing off what you’ve written above).  Believe me when I say that they have seen this before and won’t judge you. 

 

I used to to live my life in a spiral of self loathing and feelings of worthlessness so I get how it feels, but things only started to turn around for me when I opened up about how I felt, and I think that’s true for most people.  I really hope you find what you’re looking for with the academy, but I do think that you will probably need additional support throughout your journey.  You can find a lot of support here on the forums but please do consider speaking to a professional as well

 

Guzz xx

[Cynforgiven]

Anytime you need encouragement or just someone to listen, there's always someone here for you. I know how big that step was to post on here. And I'm sure it wasn't your first or even second attempt. But you did the thing and you're here and you aren't alone anymore. You have all of us on your team to help you when you need it. Just let us know when you need it [emoji847]

[Cynforgiven]

.... And I so forgot to crop my screenshot... Duh! LoL