To feel like life is more hassle than it's worth

[OptimismvsRealism]

Up until now I suppose there have been adventures and new things to try to distract from the fundamental fact that being alive is a great big chore. Endless hoovering and bills.

Don't get me wrong, I'm here now and I'll just see where things go but if you asked me if I'd like to do it all again that would be a big fat non merci from me.

Hi @OptimismvsRealism and all the other posters questioning what the fuck is the point of living.
I've had some dark times, it's happens every so often and I wonder if suicide would be better. Anti depressants keep me here I think. And I do have some joy.
Childhood trauma causes untold immeasurable damage to us in my opinion. I have worked hard to keep its effects in check. For some people though it seems impossible to overcome.
I wonder too if being very sensitive and aware of all the ills of the world - created by humans-doesn't help. Look at the major and minor conflicts and abuses in the world. I find it utterly soul destroying.
So I don't watch the news. I stopped working. I keep looking for things that make me happy. Work is a con let's face it. My career harmed me in many ways, I was not suited to it. There are countless others in similar situations I imagine.
So small wins all the way. And medication. My coping mechanisms.

OP I hear you! I've come to the realisation that for whatever reason for most situations in life I do not fit in! Luckily I work from home for myself but it's a solitary life apart from for my immediate family I'm pretty much alone and therefore wonder who / what it is all for.

Yes we have an okay quality of life these days which gets me through and knowing I can provide for the kids etc but yep life's struggle doesn't get any easier once you get older and feel more alone. It's weird that I always used to think not being poor would be life changing and now I can say that being poor feels similar to being friend-less in a way - it's the absence of something and the missing of something which affects your quality of life. But I still love my kids and husband, still love music, still have a faith, still have a skeleton set of friendships and relationships and they keep me going. Life is tough though and I think it is supposed to be that way if I think really deeply about it. We are meant to be here to toughen up and find a faith and rise above earthly stress as best we can. xx

@MsLuxLisbon drippy? Eeyore?

Your language is really negative and unempathetic, as is the way you casually brush aside depression not based on major life events.

Some people are brought up in a way that makes it hard to feel joy. And then circumstances might compound it and it takes a while to change that mindset.

It's fine to point out ways of feeling joy - watching birds etc. Name calling, and citing vague banalities like 'get a sense of humour' aren't helpful to anyone.

Depression is usually not based on life events, that's what I'm saying. It is a broken brain and it is usually treatable. I am being a little brisk because I am tired of people encouraging each other to feel that this gloom is inevitable. It isn't, and it is actually more unkind to enable each other in the name of 'empathy' than to provide a reality check.

“ citing vague banalities like 'get a sense of humour' aren't helpful to anyone.”

It was not “get” a sense of humour, it was “find your” sense of humour. As in dig deep to find what amuses you, what makes you laugh- as a coping strategy. Humour can help to get us through dark times- that was the sentiment here.

OP, I’m no psychologist but if you have felt like this your entire life (you’ve discarded hormonal change due to perimenopause ), I think you are depressed.

please access some therapy? It’s so sad thst you’re just wasting so many years waiting for death! Give it a go.

Even so drugs do not work for every person. I am medicated myself but I am still depressed a lot of the time.

So a good thread has been ruined with the sunshine brigade and now you are having to argue for your right to feel how you feel in a thread dedicated to people sharing their stories/feelings with each other.

Why did the sunshine brigade come in at all?

some very interesting responses here. I wonder if it is a combination of being mid life, where it feels like there are not that many new things to look forward to, and feeling like you're expected to be wonderful and achieve loads and have the perfect life and yet knowing we are all just a little tiny nugget. Trying currently to find a way out of this, some great woman wrote about about completely renewing her life at 50 and feeling reborn, can't remember who it was but will come back to me (a well known author). I liked the story about the woman who looked after you after school- that's it, I do feel as if small actions are enough, you can still congratulate yourself for doing a little good thing.

I don't understand the 'not having many new things to look forward to' in mid life. That seems odd to me. I can understand someone in their seventies feeling like that, but not someone in their forties or fifties. I am at the beginning of my forties, so I maybe don't count as mid-life, but I feel far more contented and yet invigorated than I did in my twenties. They say that youth is wasted on the young, and I do feel that there is some truth to that old saying. Forties are the time when a lot of people's kids are getting older, finances are more settled, and you can do more with your life than before. Obviously, there are exceptions, but I love being this age.

@MsLuxLisbon it's not terrible but I've found that having a family has meant massive compromises, e.g. living abroad, kind of stuck in the same location til kids are out of the house, etc, and I am more fearful of seeking out new experiences and opportunities because I have responsibilities and a mortgage to pay, I have to answer to people close to me for any life decisions. I feel that rather than 'spending' your life you are trying to keep and preserve what you have. Maybe it comes from failed marriage, fact I haven't really found my career niche, etc, but I feel a bit tired of striving for glory and joy and fun as it seems very hard to get - the price of it all has risen, a bit like how I would also now gain weight by just looking at a biscuit - everything costs more effort and I feel fearful as well as hopeful about the future.

Ah, I'm sorry that things are tough for you. Obviously, everyone is different and we all have different places where the shoe pinches, as it were. I had most of my stress and angst during my twenties, and I feel as if getting all that hurt out early did me good and has given me a valuable perspective: I feel as if I can survive most things as I have already tested my own resilience.

@OptimismvsRealism This is definitely me 😂 Just love sleep more than ANY other activity I could/would be doing. Some people tell me Im depressed if I feel that way but Im actually not. I totally get you 😊

@MsLuxLisbon I feel a bit bruised after marriage breakup, move, divorce, many job changes, all while parenting, from ages 39-43 or so. I am more settled now at 48, have lovely kids, OK home, OK job and lovely partner, and way more resilient, but resilient plus sadder and wiser iyswim. It might be that I only matured at that stage of life and didn't have any major problems in my 20s which might have been better to have early on. So got wise very late as it were. Anyone who knows me would describe me as a very upbeat, funny, positive person full of interests and energy, but inside it is a different story and I beat myself up about my failures and don't even take a second to enjoy successes, I have to force myself to do that. Is all fine but think I need to get that new perspective and find some peace.

I'm autistic. Life is always going to be shit. I'm effectively an outcast unless I can successfully mask 100% of the time and that's never going to happen.

Why the need to mask? Autism is very much accepted now many people are diagnosed with ND now so surely you don’t need to mask anything? I think a statement like “life is always going to be shit” points more to depression than autism- there are many happy autistic people who don’t think life is always going to be shit.

Exactly.

Unless you have autism, please do not question the need of an autistic person to mask. The fact you say that autism is accepted just goes to show you have no real life experience of the person who has the condition.

I don't even know where to begin 🤦🏻‍♀️ you have absolutely no idea what you are talking about in the slightest.

Isn't it about finding a purpose and then following it. Probably supporting others is what gives my life purpose.

I am not sure that is anything more that this 😀

This thread really resonated with me. I spent most of my childhood looking forward to growing up and becoming an "adult".

It felt so exciting the thought of paying bills, owning a house, getting married even just cooking what you want for your own dinner!!

Nearly 20 years later, I am dreaming of paying off the mortgage which feels like the heaviest weight on our backs along with collossal childcare fees, drowning in household monotony and nothing but a basic AI holiday to get us through the next year!!

I do find joy in seeing my children's faces light up with the simplest things - an ice cream, their favourite fruit, the beach, the garden, bubble wands. But other than that, life is one big slog!

Yes I do. I know that having a disability does not mean “life is always going to be shit.” There are many seriously disabled people who have extremely positive outlooks that I have spent a lot of time with over my career. That particular outlook screams of serious depression. You have absolutely no idea what you are talking about in the slightest.

I'm almost 40 and this post has absolutely resonated with me. Life feels like a slog with a few nice bits interspersed. The ambitions and dreams I had when i was younger started to fade in my early thirties and I've really lost my zest for life recently.

I'm childfree but always wondered whether having kids would have made life more meaningful, so it's interesting that so many parents have posted on this thread saying they feel the same.

I think that part of the problem is that people want life to be 'meaningful'. Something does not have to have 'meaning' to be enjoyable, we are not all put on earth for some mighty purpose. Life can and should be about finding pleasure and interest in the mundane and day to day. And if you are having children because that gives life purpose, that is foolish and a poor reason for having children.

I think people still need to acknowledge that while, obviously the OP is not required to mask, some non-masking behaviours are likely to inhibit social relations with other people in some situations.

From helping my own autistic godson in his teens to figure out how to navigate friendships, one of the things I helped him with was how to figure out when he was boring someone, by checking body language etc. He had a tendency to monologue at length on pet subjects regardless of who he was talking to, the circumstances etc. Realistically, few people, even those interested in the topic, are going to want to be talked at in the pouring rain for twenty minutes when they're in a hurry.