Does anyone else feel robbed of their youth? I wasted my teenage years in the closet, isolated and hating myself and I just can't stop thinking about it. I also went to university long before i was comfortable with myself so felt like i've wasted that too...being unconfident, in the closet and making friends with all the wrong people. Everything is making me feel so bitter and jealous towards straight people and I don't want to feel like this. I am naturally a positive, jolly person and people like me, but i just seem to have lost all motivation and happiness because I have so many regrets and have wasted so many opportunities. Now I've nearly finished uni and am feeling confident in my self finally, but so frustrated that I couldn't have even had a year at uni where I could have been myself, carefree and actually had fun. Now I have to move back in with my parents and get a job which just sounds boring and I will probably have no friends if I carry on being miserable. I don't know what to do, I just want to start my life again, or even just from 18:bang::icon_sad:
Damn, I've found myself in the same situation - still am now to be honest. I decided I couldn't go to uni (which would have to be overseas) because I'd crumble, alone and depressed. Definitely wouldn't have coped. Now I feel like I endlessly job seeking and can't escape my parents. But I've joined some groups and met some new people as myself at last, and they've really helped. I still feel like crap all the time but at least I've got people to bitch to, who understand that sometimes I'm miserable but a lot for the time I'm positive and fun. If you want to chat, message me anytime
There's no starting over, so just find the motivation start now . Imagine if you did that up until in your thirties ? Or forties ? Or fifties ?
I think most of us have felt like this at some point in our lives. I know I have. Not just about the closet, but other mistakes. If I could go back I would too, but the past is out of our control, and since for me the past is shitty, I'm looking for my happiness in the present and the future. Nobody really has the happy life story they post to facebook, having an atypical history and baggage makes you more normal than not. =)
This was pretty much me during those teen and college years, except for the making friends with the wrong people thing. Instead, in high school I failed to support a friend who came out of the closet, then put myself in social isolation in college, because I was so uncomfortable with myself. I have that regret of missing out, too. Every time I walk past the PFLAG LGBT teen social gettogether flyer posted at the library, I feel a pang of regret. How much better would my life have been - back then as well as now - if I'd accepted myself and gone to one of these groups? But, you'll drive yourself crazy - and into a very dark, sad place - if you fixate on how things could've been different. Believe me, I've done enough of it to know. All that matters is that you accepting yourself now, that you have as much time as you do have. As for myself, sure it'd have been nice to have reached self acceptance at 15 years old, but doing so at 25 is better than waiting until 35, 45, or 55. Your next stage of life is still full of opportunity. You can still find groups of people to meet with, and maybe you'll even find a few LGBT friends at whichever job you find. Even if you find a group that meets on a mutual interest that isn't specifically LGBT, you might still find friends/romance/etc. though it. There's something out there for you; you just have to look for it, hard though it may be.