Should've been more specific. Yes when 9/11 happened it did hit the company the same year, but we were still above water and then went on a slow decline over the years to a point where 70% of the employee had been laid off. Even though I wasn't the one in that group, I still left the company due to salary freeze and the uncertainty. I had worked in the electronic communications field.
I've given this some deep thought. I'd like to preface this by saying I don't dwell on the negative except the lessons. It's not to say that losing or bad experiences don't trouble me, but I digest and move on from them if I can. I also wouldn't change a single thing about my life because it made me the person I am today. My worst years were probably when I was 11 to 15. My mother is a real piece of work and 'left' my father because he was an 'alcoholic' (a lie I later found out to cover her drug issues and make her look like a victim to me and her side of the family) when I was 18 months old. She immediately left me with my grandparents, which were probably the best days of my childhood: a warm, loving, stable functional household. I lived with them until I was 7, when I moved back in with my mother and her boyfriend, who would eventually become my stepfather. We lived in Houston for a year, and I went to an almost all black school, and being a super white kid, I got picked on a lot, then started just starting the fights I knew were coming. It wasn't terrible, to be honest, but as we were settling in, we moved to Alvin. Those early years in Alvin were pretty awesome, lots of kids to play with, good school, woods and fields to run around in, because it was the 1980's and no one paid attention to their kids. I was in gifted & talented classes in Elementary at the time, and it was challenging enough and the kids were more or less also the bright ones. As I got older, I suffered from more and more seriously debilitating migraines, the type that put you in bed for days. My parent's response was just to let me deal with it, because they were 'recovering' addicts, and any drug was bad, even Ibuprofen. I think it was the combination of preservatives in the junk we ate back then, cigarette smoke sensitivity and my severe, soul-deep dislike for my stepfather. I was more and more troubled and by the time I hit fifth grade, I was removed from the GT classes and put in with the plebs. We were also poor, even though both of my parents worked, I'm not sure where the money went but it was a constant issue in the house (I remember government cheese). My grandfather died when I was 12, and he was my only real father figure. Combine all of that with puberty, and it sucked. We ended up moving again to the middle of nowhere in Alvin away from any of my neighborhood friends, so I was pretty isolated at home. I sort of coasted along and even failed seventh grade and had to go to summer school, and I distinctly remember my mother being mad at me for the inconvenience. Instead of helping me with school, they just grounded me for failing report cards, so I was grounded all school year (but still managed to pass by the end of the year). I remember those times as pretty much being a prisoner in my house, with nothing to do but read, because that was the one thing my mother wouldn't take away from me. This all led to terrible insecurity and I was bullied and lonely at school (although I had a good group of friends). My grades and attitude kept sinking and when I was 14 I got into a physical altercation with my stepfather; I pretty much told my parents to **** off after yet another angry lecture about my grades, and my stepfather grabbed me and I fought him. Instead of just letting me go, he wrestled me to the ground. That was the 'last straw' for my mother and she divorced him. Forever the victim, all of her problems were his fault. In retrospect, he wasn't a bad guy, just an angry redneck with momma issues himself. My mother, little sister and I ended up moving to a small house in Alvin a block from the High School. It was pretty liberating because I didn't have my angry strict stepfather to yell at me and my mother was preoccupied with her own **** (even more than usual). I had friends close again and could ride my bike around. My grades improved and I found girlfriends. I wouldn't even say that when I was 17 and caught my mother doing drugs, which resulted in her going to rehab (again), was a bad year respectively. She was the only breadwinner and I either had to move to my grandmother's or find a way to live on my own in Alvin and finish HS. I was effectively homeless, because for some reason it was up to me. Luckily a good friend's parents took me in, something that deeply impacted me because in retrospect, I didn't ever feel like anyone outside of my grandparents gave a ****. But still, those later years in HS were pretty good, I shed my shell and grew into a pretty big, handsome dude with a modicum of confidence, so no one picked on me anymore. I got my grades together and had all As in my senior year. So that all sucked and had resonating issues with me for a good chunk of my adult life. But it also really informed my belief that childhood innocence is sacrosanct and it's the number one job of a parent to properly raise their kids, something my wife agreed on 100%, because she had a **** childhood as well with the usual self-obsessed boomer parents (sorry boomers, it's true for the most part, but some of you are good guys). So those years were pretty black for me. It could have been worse, I wasn't physically abused or called names, but I was definitely neglected, a sad poor kid with depression and other issues. But I wouldn't change a minute of it because it made me the tough as nails person I am today.
It's all a matter of perspective. I could tell you what I personally consider the worst years of my life.....but they were also probably the most fun years of my life. I had a LOT of years immediately after getting out of the Army where I was pretty much completely out of control all of the time, routinely doing things that could have and probably should have led to INCREDIBLY bad outcomes....it just never really happened. The few consequences I faced for those years were seen as well worth it at the time. I look back at those years now and KNOW that if I lived my life like that today, I wouldn't survive it. I probably shouldn't have survived it when I did, there's several of those I knew who didn't. So, for that reason, I consider them the worst years......but admittedly I REALLY enjoyed them at the time.
@Xerobull, big respect to you, for overcoming all of that, and for sharing. My worst years were probably 13 to 18 (even though I had nothing of that kind to go through), because I always looked a few years younger than I was, like a f***ing Asian (there were no other Asian-looking people at all where I grew up in Germany) Bill Gates - looking nerd with glasses, and I spent like half of that time on crutches because I constantly had surgery on my leg (I was born with a tibia and fibula deformation in one leg, so I had to have many surgeries throughout my childhood and youth, trying to correct that). I was generally happy, but all the aforementioned things, plus growing up in a small town as the only child of a nosy and overprotective Asian mother didn't really help getting anywhere close to getting laid, which was of course all I was thinking about at that age. None of that was really anywhere near as tough as what you are describing. Everything got better once I went to university. I then had a tough time when I was in love with this beautiful Spanish girl that worked at the same company I did. It was all very complicated. She had an abortion after she got pregnant from me and didn't tell me about it until after the fact. We eventually broke up and I was very down for a while. She kind of broke my heart for a while. That was already during the Clutchfans days, early 2000s. I don't think I ever talked about it here though. Other than that, I feel very fortunate and am grateful for the life I have been allowed to live so far.
Junior year of high school; no car, no acceptance letters yet and mom was sending me to these weird sleepaway math camps over the summer for sophomore, junior and after senior year. For **** like discrete math and abstract algebra, with a full day of lectures and four hours of study hall every night; no relevance to my actual high school math curriculum or anything I took in undergrad. Lots of St. John's kids and a pretty impressive contingent from the Rio Grande Valley, but hated every second. Room and board at SWT, with three free squares at the cafeteria, so engineer dad and pharmacist mom "didn't have to" give me any spending money. You had to give a presentation on a year long project at a conference during Spring Break if you "wanted to go back" the next year, so I would just check out a book on game theory or something the week before and just read from it during my presentation. I realized later that the few times I would feel completely out of place in some study session or lecture, that I was basically in some kind of dissociative state. Indirectly retaliated by skipping high school graduation ceremony. Obviously no real adversity, but compared to every second of undergrad and adulthood, just a lot more uncertainty and frustration.
2015-2019 were beyond brutal. Trying to deal with pain and confusion with your child is a nightmare I wouldn’t wish on anyone. Then there were lots of other things compounded onto that starting point. Emotional and physical pain, etc. I thought about death a lot. I still don’t know how I managed to survive those years and I have a bit of a dissociative memory of it all.
Wow, man. That's real life right there. Glad you made it to the other side and ended up all good. Thanks for sharing. Pretty easy question for me. 2009. Wife and I had a stillborn at 38 weeks. That was really a dark year for both of us. We had the room all set up for the baby and I remember having to take everything down and disassemble the crib, etc. I closed the door so my wife wouldn't hear me crying as I was doing it. Literally the worst day of my life. Another time at work, my office was right next to a conference room where they were having a baby shower....I had to leave for the rest of the day. I was literally waking up every morning and thinking it was just a bad dream...then reality would hit and i wouldn't even want to get out of bed. My wife was prescribed some meds that really helped her but I wasn't. It was really a tough time trying to be so strong for her when I was dying inside. We got through it though. And we're much stronger now. Funny, she was the only one who ever asked how I was doing. Everyone else just asked how she was doing. That meant so much to me and still does. We always say "if we can make it though that, we can certainly make it though this." (whatever "this" happens to be at the time) In 2012, we had twin boys. Happy and healthy. I'm not a overly religious person, but I felt like that was someone up there saying to us "hey....sorry about that, man. Let me make it up to you." Wife and I both got tattoos a few months ago with our daughter's name and birth/death date. Makes me feel good knowing that now, she'll be with me forever.
Man, this hits me all over the feels. My wife and I were blessed with the birth of our son in 2018 and that has been beyond amazing. But we'd always wanted multiple kids. I've particularly always wanted a baby girl. We spent the last few years trying and had no luck. It was frustrating, because we got pregnant without even hardly breaking a sweat the first time. Now things were getting serious because we're nearing the end of our window. We tried professional help, and thought we had one in the bag... positive test and everything, then we got the unexpected bad news that it was a false positive a while later. We had to leave a dinner and go cry on each other in the car. It was devastating and miserable. Worse yet, I had just changed jobs and we now discovered our new insurance wouldn't cover fertility treatment... so we had shot our only shot and missed. This was all late last year. Now I'm sitting here with a baby girl on the way in August. Better late than never as they say
That's amazing, congrats! We went through a little of that too after 2009. What's funny is that, right about the time we stopped trying so hard, we found out we were preggo with the twins. If I remember right, we actually had an appointment scheduled with a fertility specialist. That was a fun phone call to make, cancelling that appointment.
Golden Ages for me: Age 0 - 5: Unaware of what's going on, but I remember being pretty happy. Ages 9 1/2 - 11: 1993-1996 Ages 18-23: Late 2002-2008 "College Years, early 20s." Mid 2014-Mid/Late 2015 Right now: 2017-present (have been pretty good to me) Meh: 1991-1993 1996-98 -- Middle School Worst 1998-2002: Quite a few deaths in the family, as well as few friends. Parents were going through a separation. 2008-2010 --- ??? late 2013-early 2014 -- Hardships. later 2015 -- More Hardships and bad relationships.
1st year past college. Too much debt. Started grad school and discovered I hated lab work - not good for my major. Bartended at night, loaded trucks at UPS in mornings/weekends, school in afternoons. Partied from after work to dawn more days than not. Barely slept - took every shift I could get. Used bartender job as easy way cheat on gf. Got caught regularly but she took me back bc we had a screwed up relationship that was doomed. Once debts were clear I dropped outta grad school, moved out of apartment the week after St Patricks day when I made obscene (at the time) cash at the bar, sold everything i had, including the car, and went to Asia/Europe to backpack and work odd jobs. That began one of the best years of my life where I got my **** together.
I found this depressing thread so decided to chime in with this .... I had the honor to know Nalie during her hospital visit in mid-2016, and she was documenting her journey with a camera..During her arduous journey and the deteriorating health condition, she was able to accomplish many things from Fundraising to writing two bestselling books and.. she passed away three days ago RIP Spoiler: Nalie
Guys - I want to thank each one of you for sharing in this thread. I know it is not easy but I do think that it makes us feel better to know that other people - our brethren - have had difficult times as well. As you guys know since I mentioned it earlier in this thread - I remarried my ex-wife and the mother of my son in March 2020. I was afraid for years (literally 8 years) to come back to her because I was a failure as a husband the first time around. I made the mistake of weening myself off the antidepressant I was taking (it was a small dosage but I had been taking it for close to 10 years or so) and since January of this year, I have had to deal with a loss in income (not that big of a loss but still a loss) due to low enrollment and other factors at the CC I teach and then of course my beloved dog died at the end of last month. Depression and some anxiety have come back and now I am struggling with getting enough sleep (although last night was the first night in awhile that I got good sleep). I am seeing the doctor on May 2 (unfortunately, I can't get in any sooner) and I am just hoping that I can get through April without losing my mind. I guess you will know as I will keep you guys posted in my other thread - the one about sleep, lol.
