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AIBU?

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Original poster

To ask the hardest thing you have ever been through

537 replies

Youngishh · 02/02/2025 20:49

Currently going through a divorce and it’s got me thinking about things that people go through in life. Although I am struggling with it, the hardest things I have ever been through was an abortion. I have still never got over it tbh.

OP posts:
BackAgainSlimLady · 02/02/2025 21:59

Juggling health anixety and GAD with parenting. I feel like I am constantly failing my children because I’m too anxious to take them places by myself so everything gets done on a weekend.

Health anxiety makes me really irritable and snappy and makes me feel like a totally shit parent when I get annoyed at DC just because I’m having some sort of symptom I’m worried about. I hate myself for it and have been waiting more than 20 weeks for therapy now.

nam3c4ang3 · 02/02/2025 21:59

suicide. Nothing prepares you for that.

DogsandDungarees · 02/02/2025 21:59

My ex who I worked with beat me up and then made me get out the car in a abandoned construction site to ask if we were going to stay together

Rosieposy89 · 02/02/2025 22:00

My lovely sister died aged 32 last year after a short diagnosis of cancer. The day after she died, we found out my mum has an aggressive form of cancer and is currently going through chemo. I miss my sister so much and am utterly terrified of losing my mum the same way.

adultingforever · 02/02/2025 22:00

izimbra · 02/02/2025 21:08

My beautiful, gentle, kind, clever teenage son developed severe anxiety, agoraphobia, paranoia, mania and eventually psychosis, and was sectioned for 3 months aged 17. He was diagnosed with bipolar 1 and then schizoaffective disorder.

A year after he was discharged, and his mental health had started to improve a bit, he was diagnosed with chronic myeloid leukaemia, following a routine blood test which he had because of being on anti-psychotics.

My son's life is very, very hard. My life is hard because his life is hard. I can only work part time. I can't switch off the part of my brain that is constantly worrying about his cancer or him going into mania again. Or both.

My beautiful boy developed schizoaffective disorder, then some years later had severe brain damage from a fall. I always had him in my mind, worrying, making arrangements for help for him, visiting with him, etc. etc. and then one day he just died. I will never be the same. 7 years from the fall to the day he died. I can easily understand how you must feel.

laloue · 02/02/2025 22:00

So much heartbreak here.
For me finally revealing childhood sexual abuse to my husband of 20+ years last week - the deep, animal noises coming out of me were terrifying .
My dad (not the abuser) taking his own life just as I started to earn and could visit him - he lived abroad.
My stroke at 44. Sheer bloody mindedness gets me through.

But these things are surmountable and I shall keep going.

warmbath · 02/02/2025 22:01

Cancer with 4 children under the age of 10, broke my heart trying to keep things normal from them and protecting them from knowing about my full symptoms. I still cry now years later thinking how awful it was despite counselling etc .

Staggeredatthisadmission · 02/02/2025 22:01

Simplestars · 02/02/2025 21:51

Been told that my son at 6 weeks old is totally blind.

How awful! I’m so very sorry xx

cadburyegg · 02/02/2025 22:01

I'm so so sorry for everyone's losses.

My hardest time was when my husband and I split up and my dad died very shortly after, during the pandemic. Grieving my dad (who had Alzheimer's), whilst trying to look after 2 very young children mostly alone, whilst dealing with the breakdown of my marriage, whilst having restrictions on our freedom, has definitely had lasting effects on me.

Staggeredatthisadmission · 02/02/2025 22:03

Noshowlomo · 02/02/2025 20:56

My daughter was stillborn in 2017. Her brother was born safely 18 months later but I catastrophize so much about his health even now I’ve had to have therapy on and off for years. Changed me completely

So sorry to read about your DD XX

Wickedgreengirl · 02/02/2025 22:03

We did 5 cycles of IVF to have our son, I thought that was pretty bad until we had two further IVF cycles and both baby boys died at 23 weeks just over a year apart. Completely broke me. Thankfully EMDR trauma therapy has helped me get my life back.

Everyone deals with trauma and pain differently - I don’t judge. Something minor may seem massive to someone and vice versa.

sushiandarollie · 02/02/2025 22:04

My husband being diagnosed with a rare cancer aged 35, 5 months after our wedding and when our baby was a year old (& realising he had the cancer on our wedding day) . We’d spent the previous few years going through infertility and IVF and I thought that was the hardest thing at the time. It’s changed us forever.
I still get sad when friends have weddings, have children when they want ,with no worries about the future. A friend always talks about doing things with her children as teenagers (they’re preschool age) and we can’t think that far ahead. I’m constantly terrified.

PickleJelly · 02/02/2025 22:05

So sorry for everyone's losses. It's a devastating read. Please take care of yourselves. My mum killed herself recently, I had to identify her body after they found her in a river.

CrowsInMyGarden · 02/02/2025 22:05

@Topseyt123 Thank you. He seems ok now. Was such a worrying time.

sopae · 02/02/2025 22:05

Rainbowgrey · 02/02/2025 20:55

Finding my little boy dead in his cot, he was 12 months old.

There are no words, that took my breath away. Wishing you strength xx

PermanentTemporary · 02/02/2025 22:05

A very hard thread. It doesn't seem so bad as some of these, but at the time being with my dh as he descended into a psychotic episode, trying ineffectively to get him help, then being sent home as he was 'low risk' and then he took his own life at home with me that day. It was so terrifying. I was also desperate to stop ds coming through the door from school - the only person who listened to me and took action that day was the school receptionist. Tbh she really might have saved ds's life - she certainly prevented a huge trauma for him.

TheGlitterFairy · 02/02/2025 22:06

My DB taking his own life - just horrendous and took a long time to come through it.

lots of IVF treatment / rounds / transfers / surgeries - took many years and was so very hard but have amazing DS now

Thelimitdoesnotexist9 · 02/02/2025 22:06

Growing up with two alcoholic, physically abusive parents. I never felt safe. I finally escaped at 19 and my entire adult life has been a muddle of counselling, grief for my non existent childhood and anger. I hate that it’s had such an effect on me and I wish I could just operate like a normal human being, but the trauma is so deep that it is triggered by so many things. It’s a painful process but hopefully one I’m finally emerging from. My DD is now the light of my life and I take so much solace from the fact I’m breaking the cycle and she will never experience that.

CrowsInMyGarden · 02/02/2025 22:06

@WhichOneIsPosher It was about 12 years ago and he has seemed well since. Recently started therapy as was feeling a bit low but now seems happy.

Nonaynevernomore · 02/02/2025 22:07

PickleJelly · 02/02/2025 22:05

So sorry for everyone's losses. It's a devastating read. Please take care of yourselves. My mum killed herself recently, I had to identify her body after they found her in a river.

That must’ve been incredibly hard, im
sorry x

Simplestars · 02/02/2025 22:07

Staggeredatthisadmission · 02/02/2025 22:01

How awful! I’m so very sorry xx

Show quote history

But he is now 19 and amazing young man. Confident, caring thoughtful kind and bright.
He is done extremely well despite his challenges.
But at the time I was totally devastated and didn't know how my son would cope without sight. Miss out on the beautiful world. Not to be able to see me.

Dappy777 · 02/02/2025 22:08

Some of these replies are too upsetting to read. I haven’t experienced anything so bad as some of the above.

Watching my gentle, kind grandmother die of a brain haemorrhage when I was 19. That was horrible. Visiting my grandfather in the hospice when I was 21 and him begging me to visit him again. My dad being diagnosed with lung cancer and then watching him die (thankfully of a sudden heart attack before the cancer had a chance to slowly torture him to death).

The worst I have ever felt, however, has been the bouts of agitated depression. The last was in the spring of 2016. I hope with all my heart and soul I never feel so bad again. The pain was unbelievable.

JoyousGreyOrca · 02/02/2025 22:09

My mother, father and friend all dying within two months. All unexpectedly.

YourPinkBeaker · 02/02/2025 22:09

My mum died when I was 3 weeks post partum with my first who had earth shattering colic. I wanted to die with her.

Onthefence87 · 02/02/2025 22:09

RockStarMartini · 02/02/2025 21:58

I watched my sibling die in an accident when I was 8, I was the only one there and the guilt has followed me all through my life. It ripped my parents apart - my father became an alcoholic and my mother married an abuser, one awful event triggered so much more sadness.

How awful! So sad your parents couldn't stay strong for you to protect you from further trauma....