OnMyLast Legs
Too many regrets
- Oct 29, 2024
- 99
Hi, everyone. I'm 35 and I live like a child. Since a psychotic episode six years ago I've stayed with my dad. My only "job" is coaching high school wrestling. It gets me out of bed most mornings and I still work out for myself but I know I'll never be competitive again. The wrestling thing has pretty clearly been psychological regression: having failed to become an adult, I went back to running my teenage operating system.
For 15 years since I quit in college I've had this dream in the back of my mind: I'll come back, I'll get into great shape, I'll achieve glory after all. But I won't. I had talent and I discarded it. (I thought I was becoming some kind of intellectual--turns out it was just bipolar mania and the Dunning-Kruger effect.)
I've always cared a lot about being a muscular guy. I do not have a strong personality, so I rely on my body for confidence. But it's clearly not what it was. And it doesn't make me money. If I'm going to survive, I'll have to rely on my mind like most people.
Has anyone made it through such a transition? How do I accept aging and let go? I need to finish the last 10% of college and start some kind of white collar work. I probably still have the IQ for it, though I've lost some through depression and pot smoking.
My main problem is regret, and memories of an often-beautiful but ultimately wasted youth. I've had little tastes of a kind of happiness that will never return. I was jacked, and my hair hadn't fallen out. I dated smart and beautiful women who are now very successful (thanks, Google). My friends were brilliantly intelligent. I'm a tired bald guy on food stamps who opens his eyes before dawn every morning and immediately thinks of death.
How do I go on?
Thanks for reading my long, self-indulgent post. Maybe other people here can commiserate, or even offer advice.
For 15 years since I quit in college I've had this dream in the back of my mind: I'll come back, I'll get into great shape, I'll achieve glory after all. But I won't. I had talent and I discarded it. (I thought I was becoming some kind of intellectual--turns out it was just bipolar mania and the Dunning-Kruger effect.)
I've always cared a lot about being a muscular guy. I do not have a strong personality, so I rely on my body for confidence. But it's clearly not what it was. And it doesn't make me money. If I'm going to survive, I'll have to rely on my mind like most people.
Has anyone made it through such a transition? How do I accept aging and let go? I need to finish the last 10% of college and start some kind of white collar work. I probably still have the IQ for it, though I've lost some through depression and pot smoking.
My main problem is regret, and memories of an often-beautiful but ultimately wasted youth. I've had little tastes of a kind of happiness that will never return. I was jacked, and my hair hadn't fallen out. I dated smart and beautiful women who are now very successful (thanks, Google). My friends were brilliantly intelligent. I'm a tired bald guy on food stamps who opens his eyes before dawn every morning and immediately thinks of death.
How do I go on?
Thanks for reading my long, self-indulgent post. Maybe other people here can commiserate, or even offer advice.
