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Hey Pandas, What Was The Hardest Time Of Your Life, And How Did You Make It Through? (Closed)
Mine was dealing with cancer and chemotherapy. I don't know why people call cancer patients 'fighters' and say things like 'beat the ugly monster', etc. There's nothing you can do as a cancer patient but passively receive treatment. It is a mental battle, though, and hard to remain positive all the time. The hardest part was seeing the sorrow in the eyes of my loved ones. But all is well now, fortunately. How did you overcome hardship?
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#1
My hardest time is right now, since my wife of 30 years died suddenly in December. I've posted about it on BP a number of times since.
How did I make it though? I haven't. Yet. Hopefully it will come.
Frances Pitchoune 1 week ago
Poor you! I wish you good luck and the best for you in the future.
RELATED:
#2
Right now. Around 2021 I started having tremors in my left arm which progressed over time which turned into pain as well. After seeing a neurologist, I do have a brain but it is not broken, but he saw weird labs my Primary did not notice and found out I am anemic but like most; in the other way I have high levels of iron, that was not the problem. After 2 + years I found out I have stenosis which is bone growth in my vertebrae. Had an MRI to discover and first surgery was cleaning out and fusing my C5 to C6 to C7. Originally the surgeon thought it would be years like 10 till I needed my next, but at my annual follow up they aw on that MRI my spinal cord was already bruised and needed immediate surgery on C3 and C4. That was 14 months a part and just 2 months ago. Physical and mental damage and yet work questions me non stop as if it is not medically related. I am still trying to get through it and always questioning myself, not because of me but the way I worry how every other person looks at me. I worry I will lose my job because I cannot always be at my best, before my first surgery I almost got fired because I looked bad, lost my balance and mental stability from major nerve damage which I found out will never heal, so my left side will be in pain to some degree. I try making it through with my wife who has finally realized it is something I cannot control but a medical condition, stenosis, but very aggressive and keeps getting worse. My work I feel like I am walking on egg shells, but just trying to stay strong. I have through my life been a strong figure with many people looking to me as a leader in the Navy now I feel like I am falling. I know I am not and stay positive. Not through it yet, no where near close but will keep driving forward by staying positive and looking for a good future.
Dorothy Smith 1 week ago
I'm so saddened by your painful life journey. I will pray for you to at least have lessened pain.
#3
My second relationship. My first ended badly, with her cheating on me, telling me about it and how much better the other guy was, then finding out she was engaged to be married. To a different guy. While still recovering from that, I ended up getting involved with someone else. Short version, that ended with her admitting she was deliberately pushing me to commit sui cide.
How did I get through it? I didn't. To this day, no one knows why I didn't stay de ad.
Frances Pitchoune 1 week ago
With such a personality, this person was simply toxic and didn't deserve your love. I hope you never see her again!
#4
I have Meniere's disease and had lost 90% of the hearing in my right ear but had very good hearing in my left. Late on Friday, Oct 2, 2020 (yep - 2020, the cursed year) I started having a flare in my left ear, the good ear, and couldn't get to the ENT until first thing on Oct 5. I woke up with 0 hearing in the left ear; overnight I became profoundly deaf. Two Cochlear Implants later, I have hearing but have lost so much - being able to enjoy music (music sounds like noise), theater, movies, lectures, large spaces, books on tape, crowded spaces, hearing waves at the beach (the wind is too loud) and much more. It was very hard; it is still very hard.
#5
There have been a number of hard times but I have emerged stronger, more savvy, even victorious and still willing to help others while caring for myself.
Leaving my homeland (Aotearoa/New Zealand) to move to Australia made my heart ache for years, despite the economic advantages. Actually, I still have homesickness after 40 years!
Being deliberately bullied in my workplace to the point of nervous breakdowns, partly because of my undiagnosed ADHD but also because of spite and jealousy, lack of tolerance for difference (some sad pitiful people prefer to strike out from fear - they can't stand comparison, so they have to destroy you). That was really hard but it made me work at understanding myself and others, plus learned to be brave and more resilient. I think I grew up. (As much as anyone can - lol). And I won my case and was awarded substantial compensation through Worksafe, so there's that.
Earlier than that was seeing my family start to disintegrate because of d**g related issues of one nephew I helped raise. I thought I was really close but after the final blowup, I saw that I had only seen what I wanted to see and what he wanted me to see. He stole so much from us and all, and not just material things.
Finally, my parents died though years apart. Mum went in a week (smoking related brain aneurysm) and Dad over some years, with stroke after stroke, heart attack after heart attack. I was so close to them both. (Yes I now realise I was the 'golden child not that that's any reason to crow.) It's incredibly painful to watch people you love suffer. All you can do is to be there, love them, help them and then let them go. They come back when they are ready. Love is the only real thing. Everything else is illusion.
#6
I made it through because I had to. It helps that other people and your own pets are there. If you don't have people get a pet. They keep all your secrets..
#7
For the last five years employment has been uncertain. I live alone, don't have a support system and it has been incredibly rough. Worked temp jobs, but it is still difficult knowing where your next pay check is coming in, and how. No family. Moved here just as covid hit so I didn't have a chance to make friends, which is always hard to begin with.
Being in my 50s with a long professional work history, I had a great opportunity through a placement agency. I tested positive for THC, which is legal in my state, but is a NO with the agency. Lost that one. More depression.
I had interviewed for a union organization in December, but got a great temp job for two months and they called in February. I politely turned them down because it was important for me to meet my current obligation (which ended March 22).
Well, they called me back last week, we did a second interview, and I start Monday. Phenomenal benefits and small collective and supportive crew. It is a union for a cause I believe in: teachers.
There were long days of applying, sleeping, drinking, not eating, getting dehydrated. My advice is to avoid everything except eating, hydration, and sleeping; and if you have family and friends (which I did not) lean on them for moral support because you will need it in this job market. Also, save as much $ as you can for a rainy few months. Most of all, fight the negativity that can take over in an instant.
JK (Submission author) 1 week ago
I want to add that on my worst days, I could come here an find solace and uplift. The pet threads, artists, cartoonists, most of Mr. H's threads, photographers and others have all helped me get through this bleak period. And commenters, you are the best. Thank you for giving me an escape from americanism and encouraging me to explore new ideas and places, even if I can only do it online, it is pretty amazing the historical places I didn't even know about. Thank you!
#8
During 2014-15, I was a full-time teacher, and also married to my now-late husband. It was the worst year of my life personally and professionally. Personally, J-- went into the hospital four times: two minor cardiac arrests, once for something else and came out with a couple of stents; the last time with Fournier's gangrene (DO NOT look this up, I beg you). That last time had him in the hospital for a month or two, and in a care facility for another month, plus home health care when he came home.
Professionally, I had to deal with three narcissists at work: one benign, who was annoying and a book/supply hoarder, but I could deal with her. She was a one-upper, and all about herself, but whatever. I could have worked with her long-term without major incident. The other two were fragile malignant narcs. One was my direct supervisor, and the other a cow-orker (dash is correct). In various petty ways they made my life hell, but long story short, I outlasted, out-maneuvered them and stayed in my job with a clean record, because everything they complained about me was not applicable or just so petty it was mind-boggling.
My doctor that year said I was under "killing stress". I said I know, but I can't die, because husband needs me. We got through. J-- lived another 14 months after that, and died in 2016 of pancreatic cancer. We had 17 years together, and in his last six months, got nearly every part of his estate done. Life is good now, just different, and I survived. Sometimes, that's all you can say, and the best you can hope for. Life is good now.
#9
I do not have an answer for you, just commenting on what you put above, I am glad you got through it! Hope you are good and healthy now!
#10
I've mentioned this before but a couple years ago I forgot to eat for 8 days; started falling (I used to study martial arts, was a ballroom dancer). Then I learned that most people can actually picture things in their 'mind's eye - I can't, all I see is the inside of my eyelids. Then I found out that people can compare something they did in the past with something they are doing now (SDAM, severely deficient autobiographical memory); included in the SDAM is I have only random images of what I have done in the past - example, I have a memory of getting high with some friends in what used to be a brothel - I have no idea where this was, how I got there or where I went after. I discovered that other people can listen to a song from beginning to end whereas I can make it about 8-10 bars in and suddenly, my mind is elsewhere. For all of you olds, I have not even heard "Wild Thing" all the way through (I get as far as 'you make my heart sing').
Back to the memory thing, I forget people if they are not around - lost some girlfriends due to this (one moved at the same time as I went to Montana for 2 weeks - she never called me so I did not even think of her. There are more but you get the drift)
I am pretty sure I am asexual (leaning hetero) but apparently, I was attractive enough that women would approach me on the bus, at the bar, walking down the street - I did not learn that it was okay to say 'no' so I have had an embarrassing # of sexual encounters. (my joke was the women could trip me and beat me to the floor)
I am actually a good person (or at least working on it); my vanity plate reads IYQYQR when you say it out loud it sounds like 'I like you like you are' - if only I could apply this to myself
tl;dr - long, screwed-up, full life with surprises
I am back in counseling to try to wrap my head around this stuff
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