feel like a freak

[justneedtovent1]

hi.

before i start i want to say i have suspected autism although i'm not sure if that has anything to do with this, and i'm still a teenager.

every now and again i have a few days where i just do things that i did in my childhood. i eat the same foods, i watch the same youtubers and play the same games.
i feel calm and almost peaceful when i do this and i almost wish i could spend all of my life feeling like this.
i'm not sure how to explain it properly but it is probably the happiest i feel, not an excited overwhelming happiness but just contentment.

i start to do the things i did in my childhood, such as digital art or watching adventure time.

the rest of the time when i'm not like this, i just have a normal life but i feel stressed, even when there's nothing to be stressed about. just a sort of anxiety that's always there, just waiting to explode but i never do.
it's usually then that i come back to whatever this is.

i haven't always done this but i can't remember when it started, and it isn't obvious enough that my parents or anyone else notices it, it's just sort of how i feel mentally, and subtle things i do physically.

almost all of it is stuff i did at my friends house, and i often look back at my childhood and envy her, how she was 'innocent' for a long time, even when our other friends would make fun of her for it, she'd still watch disney movies when she was 13, as far as i know is still wearing her lilo and stitch onesie, but i never had that.
i knew what various sexual acts were when i was 8, i was on omegle talking to old men when i was 7, and the memories i have of early childhood are almost completely not nice ones.

sorry, not sure where i'm going this, but i've never told anyone and i feel like a real freak.

You really aren't a freak, anything that comforts you can't be bad. My DD is 23 and suffers bouts of terrible anxiety, she will re-read Harry Potter because it helps her, she must have been 8 the first time she read it, she will also re-watch older films.
Its no different to adults colouring in.

i feel like i'm trying to have the childhood my friend had, even just small things of how i felt when i was about to go to sleep at her house, i spent almost all of my time there and i can honestly say i felt more comfortable with her family than i ever did at home.

i spent my whole childhood when i was home sitting on my ipad, i don't have any siblings and i was a difficult child so my mum didn't spend much time doing child activities with me.
i love my mum and i don't blame anything on her but i feel like i had to spend my whole childhood being an adult.

i discovered porn when i was about 6 or 7, my ipad was loaded with virus's but i told my parents i didn't know where it came from and by the time i was about 7/8 i could lie better than i could tell the truth.

i still have to remind myself to tell the truth even when i'm not in any kind of trouble.

hi thank you for replying so quickly.

it is really comforting to me that i'm not the only person, i've been worried to look it up in case of what i would find and to be honest i don't even know what i would look up in the first place.

Hi OP

I think what you are talking about is really normal - it's why adults read books like Harry Potter or or other kids books, or like fishfingers for tea when they're feeling stressed. Most people have comfort food or books or find childhood rhythms soothing - it's harking back to a simpler safer time. It sounds like your friends house was a safe place for you.

I'm sorry you feel anxious - generalised anxiety is really common. It does sound like you could do with the opportunity to talk about it and learn a few more skills to help you manage it. I think it might be worth you talking to someone about this - if you are at school or college is there a counselling service? If not make an appointment with your GP and they will be able to help. It also might be worth looking for CBT courses for anxiety online. You are definitely not a freak, it's just a strategy you've developed to help with stress - it's a way of looking after yourself.

I do similar things like watch Pokemon, read fanfiction for various fandoms and snack on comfort food. I was watching the cartoon of jumanji the other day and Ace Lightning. I think its nostalgia for when we were young and thought there was always a hero and the day would always be saved. Sometimes its nice to pretend we still believe that.

Whether its relevant or not I don't know but from the sounds of it we have some shared childhood experiences.

The porn isn't your fault and you're right it did rob you off an innocent childhood.
Just look at what people like to do, cosy up in their jammies, watch films, have character clothing , collect Star Wars memorabilia etc. Load of older teens and adults love Disney. My DD2 is totally different from DD1 but she collects Squismallow toys.
I love old fashioned fabric and knik knacs because it reminds me of my childhood.

i was supposed to have appointments with camhs which is how i know i may have autism, a little under a year ago i had my last appointment and they said they would get back to us to sort our next one and we haven't heard anything back so sadly no support there.
my school i'm at now has a sort of 'student support' however not the type that i can properly talk about mental health to if it's not related to school stuff.
thank you for being kind and reassuring me

I would go see your GP OP, to get on a list for CBT counselling for anxiety, and also so they can assess your level of anxiety which will help them help you.

i sometimes think to myself that i would love to have children (in the future) because i could give them the childhood i never had, like the childhood my friend had.
sometimes i play the sims and will create the most mundane family, turn off autonomy so i have full control over them, and most people would be bored stiff if they had to play it but it is very comforting to me and i can spend hours a day playing it when i start.

You were a child and you should have been protected from those things. It wasn't your fault.

I think it is probably good for you to do these things that you did in childhood that give you a contented feeling.

This reminds me a bit of something that adopted children sometimes to do when they have become comfortable in their new adoptive family (I realise this is a different situation but often also with some level of attachment disturbance or trauma experienced in childhood). It is not uncommon for them to regress to an earlier stage of childhood and want to do things that are developmentally inappropriate for their physical age - for example wanting to drink from a bottle, or eat puree, or be cuddled to sleep at night. But this is quite normal and is on a psychological level a way for them to 're-do' or re-experienced stages of their development that were disturbed or which they did not get to experience at that age.

Would it make any sense to you to think of these activities that you do as "re-parenting yourself" in the way you wish you had been taken care of?

This may be off the mark, but I have written it just on the off-chance that it might spark something for you.

thank you.

i think that it could maybe work if i thought of it like that. i always think back to my childhood and just wish i could redo it because it seems so wasted so maybe if i thought of it like that it could be like 'another chance'.