****Official**** depression thread (2 Viewers)

'St. Louis Bob said:

My Aunt/Godmother that had the benign tumor removed? Well the doctor ####ed up, it was malignant.

:deepsigh:

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'Wrigley said:

cubs

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'Dr. Awesome said:

I'll admit it - I cried tonight. I got into an argument with my dad over some baseball stuff. He was losing the argument and got a bit carried away with things. I called him out on things but that's all pretty normal with us. Arguing is a family tradition we practice regularly. Towards the end he dropped such a hurtful comment it felt like a sucker punch. It was so personal and unexpected I might have punched him if he had been standing any closer. As it was I had to bite my tongue so I didn't lash out in return. It's not that I can't be mean I've just seen what uncontrolled anger did to my parents and I fight hard to keep my sometimes short temper in check. I instead told him "At least I can have an argument without going to cheap blows." I sat for a few minutes before I realized it hurt a lot more than I realized. I left his house before the baseball game was over and cried. A lot. Then I held it together for a few minutes before crying a lot more. I'm not going to repeat the shot but he knows he went over the line (I could see it on his face when I left). Nonetheless, I feel crushed. It really was a cheap shot.I'll be damned if I'd ever share this with any of my real life friends but for you anonymous folk it feels good to get this off my chest.

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'Man In The Box said:

Could use some good vibes for one of my best buds. Doctors fear that his 1 year old daughter has a brain tumor. She goes for an MRI either tomorrow or early next week. As a father of 2 young ones, my heart breaks for he and his wife. Crying as I type this.

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'Man In The Box said:

Could use some good vibes for one of my best buds. Doctors fear that his 1 year old daughter has a brain tumor. She goes for an MRI either tomorrow or early next week. As a father of 2 young ones, my heart breaks for he and his wife. Crying as I type this.

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'El Floppo said:

ugh. feeling better today? amidst all the horribly sad #### that gets posted in this thread, dunno why yours hit me hard.do you guys have the kind of relationship where you'll talk about later, and he might apologize? or will this just sit in the backburner until the next blow-out?

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'St. Louis Bob said:

:( :(

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'eoMMan said:

'St. Louis Bob said:

:( :(

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It's opening night of the NFL!!!

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'Ministry of Pain said:

Hey folks. I thought last week was bad enough as I lost a HS classmate to suicide and some other small events but this week we had a death in the family. My wife lost her cousin, he was 32 years old. It's odd because he went fishing near the Gandy Bridge in Tampa Bay and managed to get his small boat/canoe out of the water, loaded it up, then some time later he was found slumped over the steering wheel of his car. He left behind a wife who had been married to for just 1 year and no children although they were planning. I think he took his life as there are no signs that he had a stroke, heat attack, plus he was trim and only 32 years old, most folks don't just keel over for no reason. No one wants to talk about what might have triggered it so I have just kept my mouth shut but I do anticipate whenever they get the toxicology report back that it will show some type of OD. Doesn't matter I guess. Wife and I will be away the rest of the week in case anyone is looking for me. I am checking off the grid for a few days, travel, funeral, all that stuff. Later

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caroline - last 5 weeks have been a whirlwind, but kim had a sore hip in february, and it has turned out to be a "non-displaced fracture" in her left hip. sadly, it has also turned out to be the result of stage 4 metastatic breast cancer in her hip, ribs, other hip, spine, pelvis, several other bones, lymph nodes, her skin, and a lung. kim received a new left hip on sunday, feb. 19, and she has undergone a couple of biopsies and 10 radiations to the left hip area and her ribs. last week, she spent days in bed while battling pneumonia. she is now using a cane and getting around ok. this has hit us hard, and the oncologist hopes that kim will live "for many months" under the current regimen of treatments. her tumors are estrogen-receptor positive, so she is taking Arimidex, a hormone therapy to block estrogen, and radiating areas as they give her pain. if the hormone therapy does not slow the tumors' growth, then chemo. if chemo does not slow them, then the dr. has said that she will face a "short interval." this has been 5 weeks of consistently bad news, but kim is bouncing back from the pneumonia and staying positive. please say a prayer for her, and i'm sorry to bear such hard news. karl

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'YSR said:

Got an email from my high school Latin teacher/mentor. I've stayed in touch with him and his family for almost 20 years now. Email is re: his wife.

caroline - last 5 weeks have been a whirlwind, but kim had a sore hip in february, and it has turned out to be a "non-displaced fracture" in her left hip. sadly, it has also turned out to be the result of stage 4 metastatic breast cancer in her hip, ribs, other hip, spine, pelvis, several other bones, lymph nodes, her skin, and a lung. kim received a new left hip on sunday, feb. 19, and she has undergone a couple of biopsies and 10 radiations to the left hip area and her ribs. last week, she spent days in bed while battling pneumonia. she is now using a cane and getting around ok. this has hit us hard, and the oncologist hopes that kim will live "for many months" under the current regimen of treatments. her tumors are estrogen-receptor positive, so she is taking Arimidex, a hormone therapy to block estrogen, and radiating areas as they give her pain. if the hormone therapy does not slow the tumors' growth, then chemo. if chemo does not slow them, then the dr. has said that she will face a "short interval." this has been 5 weeks of consistently bad news, but kim is bouncing back from the pneumonia and staying positive. please say a prayer for her, and i'm sorry to bear such hard news. karl

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I cannot speak enough against cancer.

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'El Floppo said:

Not to diminish the sad news people are getting- but seems like it's more officially "depressing" than "depression". I only say this because I am in the latter camp and struggling.

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'Buck Bradcanon said:

'El Floppo said:

Not to diminish the sad news people are getting- but seems like it's more officially "depressing" than "depression". I only say this because I am in the latter camp and struggling.

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Greetings depression thread.What floppo said above is me. Many of you have relayed stories in here that are real gut punches. Hell my best ifriend lost his dad about 3 weeks ago so just typing this feels selfish. I hope everyone is doing OK these days. Sorry to hear about your friend YSR.I have battled depression and OCD on and off for as long as I can remember. I have been on meds for OCD for about 12 or so years now and found a steady state where those symptoms are controlled.Everyone feels kind of meh from time to time and that definitely includes me. But for the past month, I have felt a deeper more consistent low than I remember feeling at any point in the last 10 years, easy. All of the "external"(?) things are great. I have a loving wife, 2 beautiful daughters, a steady job, family and extended family are healthy, etc.I have an appt with a psychiatrist next week to visit my medication/dosage but more importantly just to discuss what I am feeling. Along these lines, does anyone have a good book on depression they would recommend? A website? Im willing to listen to anything.My wife, my kids, and even myself deserve better than what I am giving right now.Thank you for listening.

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'Gadabout said:

'Buck Bradcanon said:

'El Floppo said:

Not to diminish the sad news people are getting- but seems like it's more officially "depressing" than "depression". I only say this because I am in the latter camp and struggling.

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Greetings depression thread.What floppo said above is me. Many of you have relayed stories in here that are real gut punches. Hell my best ifriend lost his dad about 3 weeks ago so just typing this feels selfish. I hope everyone is doing OK these days. Sorry to hear about your friend YSR.I have battled depression and OCD on and off for as long as I can remember. I have been on meds for OCD for about 12 or so years now and found a steady state where those symptoms are controlled.Everyone feels kind of meh from time to time and that definitely includes me. But for the past month, I have felt a deeper more consistent low than I remember feeling at any point in the last 10 years, easy. All of the "external"(?) things are great. I have a loving wife, 2 beautiful daughters, a steady job, family and extended family are healthy, etc.I have an appt with a psychiatrist next week to visit my medication/dosage but more importantly just to discuss what I am feeling. Along these lines, does anyone have a good book on depression they would recommend? A website? Im willing to listen to anything.My wife, my kids, and even myself deserve better than what I am giving right now.Thank you for listening.

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I've read several books on the topic, but none of them were good enough for me to remember the names, much less recommend them to somebody else. The same applies to websites. The best available tool out there is other people. Not necessarily family, or professionals, but people who just seem to get it. They can be hard to find but they are out there. Me, I used to get the snot knocked out of me by major depression. It came to a head about five or so years ago and I entered a state of mind that some people never make it out of. Since then it seems like the severe episodes are gone, only to be replaced by something I call a perma-funk but doctors call Dysthymia. A couple years ago I completely severed ties with doctors and meds. I now just make a conscious effort to eat better and exercise regularly. Meditation has been recommended to me but I haven't gotten around to that yet. Nature is my friend and I find myself wanting to be outdoors more and more. There's nights when it's nice and cool out over here and I go for extended bike rides. I may not physically or mentally feel like doing it, but I know that there's a big part of me that is really appreciating it. I don't know, man. There's no right answer. I even used to sit in on open AA meetings. You just need to find what works for you.

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As of Sunday, our close friend TR stopped any sort of additional treatment for his stage 4 melanoma cancer and has moved home to his folks house in Winston Salem for hospice. He was in ICU for over 3 weeks recently and has been really suffering for about 8-9 weeks. The cancer has been incredibly aggressive in his brain which has casued all kinds of problems, making any sort of additional treatment virtually impossible. the goal now is to make him comfortable and let him spend time with his wife Jen and 2 kids. It's incredibly heart breaking; we can't imagine his suffering and the suffering of his folks, 2 sisters and Jen to have watched him decline so rapidly -- this all began as a trip to the hospital for a bad headache and nausea on Dec 31st, 2011. His wife has been a rock and a saint throughout this process, with TR every step of the way. She has kept all of TR's friends updated with daily posts and shared with us the ups and downs of the last 4 months. Her strength is amazing. When this began a few months ago, we had no idea things would come to this. Physically, our friend has gone from being an amazing 36 year old athlete (tri-athlete, etc) and the picture of health, incredible father and husband to being debilitated beyond anything I can even imagine over the past 3 months. He has tried to fight it but it's too aggressive. The last couple of months have consisted of unbearable headaches, persistence and crippling nausea, pain in his back, pain in his shoulder, etc. with repeated long term stays in the ICU. His cancer is an awful, terrible disease- we hate it so much-- for what it is, what it's done to him, what it's put his family through. It simply isn't right or fair. A group of his friends have created a Livestrong racing team; we're signed up to do a running relay race from Chattanooga to Nashville in November on TR's behalf. If you are willing, please make a donation on his behalf. We have tried to figure out what we could do to help he and his wife; we'd jump in the car right now and drive to be with him if we thought it would help - we'd do anything to somehow try and fix this or ease his suffering -- but we know we can't. It's been hard to be on the sidelines knowing what he's been going through. We came to the conclusion that the best thing is to support Livestrong in his name. Ironically, TR has been an avid supporter of livestrong for years; he even hosted/organized a dinner/benefit in Nashville the night before we ran the ½ marathon in 2007 together to raise money for Livestrong.

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'YSR said:

With all respect to floppo, Buck and Gadabout in re: what you're going through/have gone through with actual depression, I need a place to put this:Learned today that my friend from college who has Stage 4 melanoma decided to stop treatment yesterday.

As of Sunday, our close friend TR stopped any sort of additional treatment for his stage 4 melanoma cancer and has moved home to his folks house in Winston Salem for hospice. He was in ICU for over 3 weeks recently and has been really suffering for about 8-9 weeks. The cancer has been incredibly aggressive in his brain which has casued all kinds of problems, making any sort of additional treatment virtually impossible. the goal now is to make him comfortable and let him spend time with his wife Jen and 2 kids. It's incredibly heart breaking; we can't imagine his suffering and the suffering of his folks, 2 sisters and Jen to have watched him decline so rapidly -- this all began as a trip to the hospital for a bad headache and nausea on Dec 31st, 2011. His wife has been a rock and a saint throughout this process, with TR every step of the way. She has kept all of TR's friends updated with daily posts and shared with us the ups and downs of the last 4 months. Her strength is amazing. When this began a few months ago, we had no idea things would come to this. Physically, our friend has gone from being an amazing 36 year old athlete (tri-athlete, etc) and the picture of health, incredible father and husband to being debilitated beyond anything I can even imagine over the past 3 months. He has tried to fight it but it's too aggressive. The last couple of months have consisted of unbearable headaches, persistence and crippling nausea, pain in his back, pain in his shoulder, etc. with repeated long term stays in the ICU. His cancer is an awful, terrible disease- we hate it so much-- for what it is, what it's done to him, what it's put his family through. It simply isn't right or fair. A group of his friends have created a Livestrong racing team; we're signed up to do a running relay race from Chattanooga to Nashville in November on TR's behalf. If you are willing, please make a donation on his behalf. We have tried to figure out what we could do to help he and his wife; we'd jump in the car right now and drive to be with him if we thought it would help - we'd do anything to somehow try and fix this or ease his suffering -- but we know we can't. It's been hard to be on the sidelines knowing what he's been going through. We came to the conclusion that the best thing is to support Livestrong in his name. Ironically, TR has been an avid supporter of livestrong for years; he even hosted/organized a dinner/benefit in Nashville the night before we ran the ½ marathon in 2007 together to raise money for Livestrong.

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I worried this moment might come but had no idea it would be so soon. I was actually at an alumni function with one of the guys running and we spoke about how TR was doing. He didn't yet know the decision that the family was making yesterday. 36 years old.

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'YSR said:

With all respect to floppo, Buck and Gadabout in re: what you're going through/have gone through with actual depression, I need a place to put this:Learned today that my friend from college who has Stage 4 melanoma decided to stop treatment yesterday.

As of Sunday, our close friend TR stopped any sort of additional treatment for his stage 4 melanoma cancer and has moved home to his folks house in Winston Salem for hospice. He was in ICU for over 3 weeks recently and has been really suffering for about 8-9 weeks. The cancer has been incredibly aggressive in his brain which has casued all kinds of problems, making any sort of additional treatment virtually impossible. the goal now is to make him comfortable and let him spend time with his wife Jen and 2 kids. It's incredibly heart breaking; we can't imagine his suffering and the suffering of his folks, 2 sisters and Jen to have watched him decline so rapidly -- this all began as a trip to the hospital for a bad headache and nausea on Dec 31st, 2011. His wife has been a rock and a saint throughout this process, with TR every step of the way. She has kept all of TR's friends updated with daily posts and shared with us the ups and downs of the last 4 months. Her strength is amazing. When this began a few months ago, we had no idea things would come to this. Physically, our friend has gone from being an amazing 36 year old athlete (tri-athlete, etc) and the picture of health, incredible father and husband to being debilitated beyond anything I can even imagine over the past 3 months. He has tried to fight it but it's too aggressive. The last couple of months have consisted of unbearable headaches, persistence and crippling nausea, pain in his back, pain in his shoulder, etc. with repeated long term stays in the ICU. His cancer is an awful, terrible disease- we hate it so much-- for what it is, what it's done to him, what it's put his family through. It simply isn't right or fair. A group of his friends have created a Livestrong racing team; we're signed up to do a running relay race from Chattanooga to Nashville in November on TR's behalf. If you are willing, please make a donation on his behalf. We have tried to figure out what we could do to help he and his wife; we'd jump in the car right now and drive to be with him if we thought it would help - we'd do anything to somehow try and fix this or ease his suffering -- but we know we can't. It's been hard to be on the sidelines knowing what he's been going through. We came to the conclusion that the best thing is to support Livestrong in his name. Ironically, TR has been an avid supporter of livestrong for years; he even hosted/organized a dinner/benefit in Nashville the night before we ran the ½ marathon in 2007 together to raise money for Livestrong.

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I worried this moment might come but had no idea it would be so soon. I was actually at an alumni function with one of the guys running and we spoke about how TR was doing. He didn't yet know the decision that the family was making yesterday. 36 years old.

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'YSR said:

With all respect to floppo, Buck and Gadabout in re: what you're going through/have gone through with actual depression, I need a place to put this:Learned today that my friend from college who has Stage 4 melanoma decided to stop treatment yesterday.

As of Sunday, our close friend TR stopped any sort of additional treatment for his stage 4 melanoma cancer and has moved home to his folks house in Winston Salem for hospice. He was in ICU for over 3 weeks recently and has been really suffering for about 8-9 weeks. The cancer has been incredibly aggressive in his brain which has casued all kinds of problems, making any sort of additional treatment virtually impossible. the goal now is to make him comfortable and let him spend time with his wife Jen and 2 kids. It's incredibly heart breaking; we can't imagine his suffering and the suffering of his folks, 2 sisters and Jen to have watched him decline so rapidly -- this all began as a trip to the hospital for a bad headache and nausea on Dec 31st, 2011. His wife has been a rock and a saint throughout this process, with TR every step of the way. She has kept all of TR's friends updated with daily posts and shared with us the ups and downs of the last 4 months. Her strength is amazing. When this began a few months ago, we had no idea things would come to this. Physically, our friend has gone from being an amazing 36 year old athlete (tri-athlete, etc) and the picture of health, incredible father and husband to being debilitated beyond anything I can even imagine over the past 3 months. He has tried to fight it but it's too aggressive. The last couple of months have consisted of unbearable headaches, persistence and crippling nausea, pain in his back, pain in his shoulder, etc. with repeated long term stays in the ICU. His cancer is an awful, terrible disease- we hate it so much-- for what it is, what it's done to him, what it's put his family through. It simply isn't right or fair. A group of his friends have created a Livestrong racing team; we're signed up to do a running relay race from Chattanooga to Nashville in November on TR's behalf. If you are willing, please make a donation on his behalf. We have tried to figure out what we could do to help he and his wife; we'd jump in the car right now and drive to be with him if we thought it would help - we'd do anything to somehow try and fix this or ease his suffering -- but we know we can't. It's been hard to be on the sidelines knowing what he's been going through. We came to the conclusion that the best thing is to support Livestrong in his name. Ironically, TR has been an avid supporter of livestrong for years; he even hosted/organized a dinner/benefit in Nashville the night before we ran the ½ marathon in 2007 together to raise money for Livestrong.

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I worried this moment might come but had no idea it would be so soon. I was actually at an alumni function with one of the guys running and we spoke about how TR was doing. He didn't yet know the decision that the family was making yesterday. 36 years old.

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'YSR said:

With all respect to floppo, Buck and Gadabout in re: what you're going through/have gone through with actual depression, I need a place to put this:Learned today that my friend from college who has Stage 4 melanoma decided to stop treatment yesterday.

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'YSR said:

'YSR said:

With all respect to floppo, Buck and Gadabout in re: what you're going through/have gone through with actual depression, I need a place to put this:Learned today that my friend from college who has Stage 4 melanoma decided to stop treatment yesterday.

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Well, that was quick. :(

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'St. Louis Bob said:

'YSR said:

'YSR said:

With all respect to floppo, Buck and Gadabout in re: what you're going through/have gone through with actual depression, I need a place to put this:Learned today that my friend from college who has Stage 4 melanoma decided to stop treatment yesterday.

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Well, that was quick. :(

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:( Sorry GB.

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'shadyridr said:

My mom's birthday today

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'El Floppo said:

ugh. So sorry to hear about this, mojo. :sad:

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'Gadzooks said:

Life can really suck. I'll take a hug......

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'Gadzooks said:

Life can really suck. I'll take a hug......

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'Mr.Pack said:

'Gadzooks said:

Life can really suck. I'll take a hug......

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I love you

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'Gadzooks said:

'Mr.Pack said:

'Gadzooks said:

Life can really suck. I'll take a hug......

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I love you

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Thanks GB. Not exactly a hug, but you made me chuckle.I love you too.

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'YSR said:

'Gadzooks said:

Life can really suck. I'll take a hug......

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What's the haps, GB? :(

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'Gadzooks said:

'YSR said:

'Gadzooks said:

Life can really suck. I'll take a hug......

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What's the haps, GB? :(

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'Gadzooks said:

'YSR said:

'Gadzooks said:

Life can really suck. I'll take a hug......

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What's the haps, GB? :(

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Combination of a lot of things. Dealing with a ridiculous amount of stress at work, really stressing about the fact that in September Little 'Zooks will be going to school all day in another town which means the time I spend with him is going to decrease a lot, also have some financial issues (who doesn't) and all I'm also realizing that I'm not dealing well with the weird "friends with benefits" relationship I had with the 22 YO. Everything with her fizzled out over a month ago but we managed to maintain our friendship, to the point of really being each other's best friend and talking about everything little that was happening in our lives. Now that friendship is starting fade. I haven't slept in a few days and it's making me evaluate everything in my life and it makes me realize I have a very "unaccomplished" life. It's weird, I keep getting this weird feeling of emptiness.I think my general happy-go-lucky attitude fools people into thinking that everything is great with me, and I think I realize that I've been fooling myself this whole time too. A lot of people have always told me that they've never met anyone who smiles and laughs as much as I do and how I always have a funny joke or remark for any situation. But looking back, I don't really see anything that I was successful at or reasons to be happy about. I did lousy in College and after being on academic probabtion my first 2 years, I didn't go back and then always figured I would finish and get my degree "later" but that has never happened (luckily, I fell into a good job and moved my way up through hard work and have a job that would usually require a Degree). All growing up I always wanted to be married and have a somewhat big family (3 kids, the dog, typical American Dream) but after getting married we went through 3 miscarriages before having our son and then another miscarriage after him which left my ex-wife unable to have anymore children. Then one day I woke up to find out she was having an affair and SHE wanted a divorce. Despite her having the affair, I still tried to make it work, but she didn't want to. That was a dark time that took a while to get out of. My only focus during that time was my son and that probably helped me not focus on what my ex wife did. The divorce also caused some financial issues, but overall I made out ok with everything (I kept the house and all of my retirement, no alimony and I just pay a minor amount of child support since we split custody) the problem is going from a 2 person income to a 1 person income and keeping the house and I took all of our debt. Once I got out of the divorce cloud, things got a little better (thank you alcohol) I figured out how to balance my time as a Dad and single guy who had every other weekend to go out and have fun. But something still felt like it was missing, I'm guessing it was not being in a relationship. Random hook ups are great and everything, but whenever something "good" would happen in life I would catch myself wanting to share it with someone like I used to with my ex. And also realizing that I was getting any younger, so any chance of meeting someone and having more kids was becoming less likely.

Finally last Fall, I came to grips that this would be my life. The single Dad that Little Zooks would come visit with his family at the holidays for a few hours and not the big family lifestyle I had imagined or hoped for. I figured I would just spend my time being a Dad and when I didn't have him, I'd go out and party and satisfy any physical need I had with a one-stand when needed. It was a sucky outlook but it was what it was and I accepted it. Then at Thanksgiving I met the 22 YO and we started a "relationship" that required complete secrecy for many reasons I won't get into (one big one was her out of state boyfriend) I though it wouldn't last long because she could have whoever she wanted and one day she'd wake up and wonder what she was doing with this 36 YO guy with little to offer. It was great, and as long as I didn't fall for her and realized this was just short term it would be fine. The reason I wouldn't fall for her was because I never thought she would fully fall for me. But then she started to fall and talked about how strongly she felt about me even though she knew we couldn't never be more than what we were. The fact that she started falling for me made me fall for her. I honestly think that if she didn't get stronger feelings for me I would've been fine with our "friends with benefits" type relationship. For about 5 months or so, I had never been happier. It was perfect. But then I think I started wanting more and trying to see if there was any chance that there could be more in the future and that pushed her away. She became distant and finally told me that she felt bad that I wanted more and she knew that couldn't happen and she didn't want me to get hurt, so she was backing off. Once we got thru that, we really had a great friendship for a few weeks, we hardly ever actually saw each other, but talked and texted every day openly discussing possible girls that I could go out and the pros and cons of each ones. She and her boyfriend were on the verge of breaking up and out of blue an old boyfriend starting reach out to her and she wasn't sure what she should do and I talked with her for hours about both situations.

In the last week or so, she was getting very distant. We got in a couple arguements and it really seems like our great friendship is ending now as well. I can't stop thinking about her and I feel like a jackass for staring at my phone all day waiting for her to text me.

I guess ultimately, everything with her is like the icing on the cake. It makes me look back at everything else and seems like everything has been one failure after another. College = fail. Marriage = fail. Having to go to my parents for financial help = fail. Work has been ok I guess, but I know I could've done better and had a better job if I finished school. Relationship with 22 YO = fail. I like to think I do a good job as a Dad, but who knows, maybe I'm just fooling myself into believing that too.

I dont' know why I typed all of that. I guess I usually deal with crap by making fun of it or laughing at it, I've never taken a serious approach to it (or anything else for that matter) I guess it feels good to get that all out though. Blah blah blah blah

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'Gadzooks said:

'YSR said:

'Gadzooks said:

Life can really suck. I'll take a hug......

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What's the haps, GB? :(

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Combination of a lot of things. Dealing with a ridiculous amount of stress at work, really stressing about the fact that in September Little 'Zooks will be going to school all day in another town which means the time I spend with him is going to decrease a lot, also have some financial issues (who doesn't) and all I'm also realizing that I'm not dealing well with the weird "friends with benefits" relationship I had with the 22 YO. Everything with her fizzled out over a month ago but we managed to maintain our friendship, to the point of really being each other's best friend and talking about everything little that was happening in our lives. Now that friendship is starting fade. I haven't slept in a few days and it's making me evaluate everything in my life and it makes me realize I have a very "unaccomplished" life. It's weird, I keep getting this weird feeling of emptiness.I think my general happy-go-lucky attitude fools people into thinking that everything is great with me, and I think I realize that I've been fooling myself this whole time too. A lot of people have always told me that they've never met anyone who smiles and laughs as much as I do and how I always have a funny joke or remark for any situation. But looking back, I don't really see anything that I was successful at or reasons to be happy about. I did lousy in College and after being on academic probabtion my first 2 years, I didn't go back and then always figured I would finish and get my degree "later" but that has never happened (luckily, I fell into a good job and moved my way up through hard work and have a job that would usually require a Degree). All growing up I always wanted to be married and have a somewhat big family (3 kids, the dog, typical American Dream) but after getting married we went through 3 miscarriages before having our son and then another miscarriage after him which left my ex-wife unable to have anymore children. Then one day I woke up to find out she was having an affair and SHE wanted a divorce. Despite her having the affair, I still tried to make it work, but she didn't want to. That was a dark time that took a while to get out of. My only focus during that time was my son and that probably helped me not focus on what my ex wife did. The divorce also caused some financial issues, but overall I made out ok with everything (I kept the house and all of my retirement, no alimony and I just pay a minor amount of child support since we split custody) the problem is going from a 2 person income to a 1 person income and keeping the house and I took all of our debt. Once I got out of the divorce cloud, things got a little better (thank you alcohol) I figured out how to balance my time as a Dad and single guy who had every other weekend to go out and have fun. But something still felt like it was missing, I'm guessing it was not being in a relationship. Random hook ups are great and everything, but whenever something "good" would happen in life I would catch myself wanting to share it with someone like I used to with my ex. And also realizing that I was getting any younger, so any chance of meeting someone and having more kids was becoming less likely.

Finally last Fall, I came to grips that this would be my life. The single Dad that Little Zooks would come visit with his family at the holidays for a few hours and not the big family lifestyle I had imagined or hoped for. I figured I would just spend my time being a Dad and when I didn't have him, I'd go out and party and satisfy any physical need I had with a one-stand when needed. It was a sucky outlook but it was what it was and I accepted it. Then at Thanksgiving I met the 22 YO and we started a "relationship" that required complete secrecy for many reasons I won't get into (one big one was her out of state boyfriend) I though it wouldn't last long because she could have whoever she wanted and one day she'd wake up and wonder what she was doing with this 36 YO guy with little to offer. It was great, and as long as I didn't fall for her and realized this was just short term it would be fine. The reason I wouldn't fall for her was because I never thought she would fully fall for me. But then she started to fall and talked about how strongly she felt about me even though she knew we couldn't never be more than what we were. The fact that she started falling for me made me fall for her. I honestly think that if she didn't get stronger feelings for me I would've been fine with our "friends with benefits" type relationship. For about 5 months or so, I had never been happier. It was perfect. But then I think I started wanting more and trying to see if there was any chance that there could be more in the future and that pushed her away. She became distant and finally told me that she felt bad that I wanted more and she knew that couldn't happen and she didn't want me to get hurt, so she was backing off. Once we got thru that, we really had a great friendship for a few weeks, we hardly ever actually saw each other, but talked and texted every day openly discussing possible girls that I could go out and the pros and cons of each ones. She and her boyfriend were on the verge of breaking up and out of blue an old boyfriend starting reach out to her and she wasn't sure what she should do and I talked with her for hours about both situations.

In the last week or so, she was getting very distant. We got in a couple arguements and it really seems like our great friendship is ending now as well. I can't stop thinking about her and I feel like a jackass for staring at my phone all day waiting for her to text me.

I guess ultimately, everything with her is like the icing on the cake. It makes me look back at everything else and seems like everything has been one failure after another. College = fail. Marriage = fail. Having to go to my parents for financial help = fail. Work has been ok I guess, but I know I could've done better and had a better job if I finished school. Relationship with 22 YO = fail. I like to think I do a good job as a Dad, but who knows, maybe I'm just fooling myself into believing that too.

I dont' know why I typed all of that. I guess I usually deal with crap by making fun of it or laughing at it, I've never taken a serious approach to it (or anything else for that matter) I guess it feels good to get that all out though. Blah blah blah blah

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