How is your year going so far?

It's odd.
It's both fucking abysmal, but also relievingly hopeful.
I finally dragged myself out of the depressive hole i had been in for a ~year an a half but am currently existentially sad and frustrated. lol
...But it will pass. And i can tell that my life has shifted.

Outside of my country being on fire and being a bit worried the small company I work for will survive, my personal life has been pretty good.
I’ve been casually seeing a new woman and it’s been nice to break out of my usual comfort zone of “you are now half of my life” relationships. And it’s given me motivation to get consistent with lifting weights because I want to look good for her (and tbh love when she grabs/holds my arm), which has really helped me control my blood sugar. I might even be able to dial back my medications depending on how my next doctor’s visit goes.

Got sick for a full week the moment I got back from my New Year's celebration visit to family, then got sick again a week after I got better from the first time. Then my apartment flooded due to a water heater busting in the apartment above me. Still cleaning up from that. Then I had to quit my job due to a toxic work environment and start a new one with a pay cut, and then the day I go to quit, my grandfather dies (wasn't close to him but the aftermath was rough.)
And now another family member is on death's door, so I'll probably have to go to a second funeral this year.
Needless to say, 2025 hasn't been my year😮‍💨

Great except I wrecked my car.
- Damn sorry to hear that. What happened?
  
  Not much point in telling it really - totally my fault, somehow I made a turn across in front of somebody, didn't even see them coming. Nobody hurt and the other car just had a busted front corner, but my car was undrivable and the insurance company totalled it. It was a 2014 Nissan Leaf. I loved driving that thing - instantly felt completely at home in it, it felt like a little spaceship.

Personally it's about the same, which is good.
But I wake up every morning worried about all the stupid nazi shit that's going on in the currrent government.

All of this decade has been the worst time of my life, but this year has been very slightly better than last at least. Really need people to start actually hiring again and for the economy to stop being the worst, but no hope there. I'm just begging for the reaper at this point.

Going awesome 😎
Inflation is going down steadily, prices are not increasing as fast as before and more credit is available now, I have an offer for a credit to buy my own home now. Let's see how that goes

artistic depictions of my 2025 so far
- Pretty epic wheelie tho
- Wow, you're really starting through and going places this year!
- Rally driving is a pretty cool hobby though in your case seems expensive.

It sucks as I’m a black, autistic and bisexual woman, whose rights are slowly taken away by Nazi Germany 2.0 (aka America) and live in a very red state. I wish can flee, but I’m broke and jobless. So I’m forced to stay.
But hey, at least I lost 10 pounds this year!
- As a German, don't bring Germany into this please 😂.
  But seriously, sad to see it all. Best wishes.
- The state of things is devastating. Actually getting out is the best option, I know easy for someone else to say. Right wingers love to point yo companies moving to red states for lower taxes and no employee protections, when people start leaving the states is when that narrative will change.
  Not sure where you are but Colorado has paid family leave and is generally fighting a good fight and may be closest to you, depending on your red state location. Depending on the type of work you donl or want to do, securing employment in advance of relocating or looking at WFH options may be the best option to allow you to get a job and then move and not have to worry about the job location piece. Coastal places with better protections and rights are expensive as hell and probably less of an option for you but depends.
  Hope you can get someplace at least measurably better and safer for you.
- What kind of job are you looking for?
- Quadruple whammy. You rolled a D1
  
  I started to argue that it would be a Nat 1. But then I realized that if a D1 existed, it would only be able to roll Nat 1’s… Which feels apt.

It'd be absolutely grand if it weren't for the collapse of democracy. There really are a lot of things coming together for me right now and I'd be so happy if I weren't worrying about having to flee the country.

2024 was all physical and emotional pain for me. Guess who found out they're Celiac and lost their broken af unrecoverable soul mate? Meeee! Woo...
So after getting misdiagnosed a bunch and having a completely fucked esophagus I've been exclusively focused on healing. The progress on that feels fucking fantastic after 2 years of slowly worsening chronic pain and unresponsive to habit changes, drugs, and diet changes to combat GERD. I just had to find out (on my own, no thanks to my doctors) my immune system was attacking my intestines and stomach/esophagus lining because I ate gluten, duh! Also my esophagus wouldn't heal until I quit smoking. Oh and I found out I have hemochromatosis from the blood work too, so that's nice.
I've been scared straight and I'm at an ideal body weight as a consequence too. Fasting helped healing immensely by just not using my digestive system for awhile. All around I'll be fit as a fiddle year end, and in better shape than I've ever been since my teenage years. Purely out of fear of dying in agony! Wow!
After this horrible arc, I can work on my social life left in shambles by covid. I went nuts and recovered barely, my lover went nuts slowly and didn't recover eventually, I lost friends some slowly some rapidly to right wing grifters, and just more mental health crash outs. Bad times. Went from 7 friends, 4 of which I hung out with weekly, to 2.5 I barely see. The busy guys I can maybe see once a month are what's left and one of them was part of a friend group that's dead and gone, and isn't comfortable hanging out 1 on 1. Anxiety thing, but we're not close as a consequence and that's a doomed relationship.
My best friend is now my roommate and I consider him family now. He'll probably also be married soon, but we're staying together with a +1. Probably for life, so that's nice. Not nice is why he's with me but that's a long story. The short of it is he's autistic enough to be on disability, and his mom is a narcissist abuser that became too much. You'll see the two cats he came with posted sometimes. All three of them are rescues :p I needed the company anyways.
So that's my rest of 2025 goals: Social life. Idk about romance just yet. I'm tired, boss.
That's it. Hopefully not too long winded. Mobile fat thumb edits.
- Thank you for sharing your story. I hope things get much better for you 🙏

So far it's been pretty good personally.
I work in stunts, and started training with a new stunt team that does some pretty cool projects. I'm not a member yet, but I keep getting invited to trainings and communicating with people in the team, so it's been going pretty good. They have a few films announced for the upcoming year, so, hopefully I get to work on a few of them!

So far, meh. Not good or bad for me and mine, but I'm watching my country devolve in double time with damned little I can do about it except prepare for the worst and hope for the best. It's a bit nerve racking to be honest.

2024 best year ever. Then everything gets undone in 2025

Honestly pretty great. I love my relatively new position at my company, my career track is great, and it seems like people above me might be aware of the good job I am doing. Plus it’s more money than I have ever made in my life, so while I’m still underpaid for my role, I get to WFH wherever I want, and this has all allowed me to buy my first house in rural northern Maine, with almost 11 acres. I close in 27 days and then I can GTFO of my parents’ house, where I have been for 15 months. With any luck I can then find a Canadian wife and get dual citizenship, the better to flee when the trump gestapo come for me for whatever made up reason they come up with.

I mean there’s all this gestures vaguely, but if I zoom into just my personal life, it’s been pretty good?
I adopted an amazing kitty on Jan 4. I’m still grieving the loss of my soul cat last year but the new girl has been a great gift in my life.
My job is very seasonal and 2025 was the most calm season of all 8 seasons I’ve done it. I work on software creation and support season, so most calm = the best season ever.
Then I went on medical leave to yeet my uterus and confirmed that I had adenomyosis, so pretty psyched to see how much this reduces my pain after I finish recovering.
So even with the shit show going on in the world, life goes on at the micro level and so far 2025 is shaking out better than ‘24.

great, self-esteem is pretty good and i've started writing fiction (it's very terrible writing since i just started, but it's writing nonetheless). my drawing skills have been improving at the usual pace and my social skills are, overall, much better than last year. a lot of school stuff to do though, ugh.

Pretty good. I became self-employed a little over a year ago and it feels like I've now reached the escape velocity where I no longer even need to advertise to get new customers. I ordered like 2500 new flyers last fall but only shared couple hundred of them and none since. I pretty much have the next 2 to 3 weeks booked full and new calls just keeps coming.
- Congrats!
- What field were you in? Happy to hear you're doing well!
  
  Thanks! Plumbing and general home improvement/property maintenance. I believe "handyman" is the term used of people like me in the US at least.

My employer was taken out of commission by a ransomware attack for nearly a month.
About when that concluded, my fiancée contracted severe pancreatitis from a fairly routine surgery and has been fighting for her life ever since.
My doctor chalks down all the extreme dizziness and sleepless nights I've had down to stress. I have to hope she's right cause I really don't have the energy to spare for being ill right now.
So in summary, less than great so far.
- I’m sorry you’re dealing with so many stressful things at once.
  I just recently learned about some causes of vertigo along with a super quick thing to try to relieve it, and I thought I would share it under the chance it might provide some relief to at least one of the awful things. It came from a newsletter by a chiropractor I saw who many years ago. I know some chiropractors are quacks, but this one was incredible at recognizing patterns and was able to provide me extreme pain relief mostly just from simple stretches he taught me, so I have high respect for what he shares.
  What are the causes I find that trigger vertigo?
  Tight suboccipital muscles at the base of the skull.
  Blocked sinus cavities not draining, backing up mucous and fluid into the middle ear cavity.
  Fluid imbalances in the inner ear due to NSAIDS and antihistamines being used in excess.
  Tight jaw muscles causing abnormal tracking of the jaw when opening and closing the mouth.
  Very rotated fixated first cervical vertebrate pinching off the eustachian tube of the middle ear that is responsible for allowing drainage to occur to the back of the throat.
  Then he provides this 1m video with a tapping technique that tracks 20 seconds.
  Doesn’t speak to the sleeplessness and I’m not a medical professional. I’m just a concerned stranger who recently gained knowledge that could maybe be helpful to you?

It's actually going not too bad compared to last year. This time last year I was living in my mom's basement, anxiety ridden, lonely, and had no money. Now, I'm in my own place, have some money to spend on myself finally, and my anxiety has gone down significantly. Still lonely but now I can distract myself and have a lot of online people I talk to no so...better than nothing. So far, I'd say not too bad.
- Sound like huge wins to me.

I've been in flight or flight mode for months now. Still haven't decided which.
- How are you posting this if you have flight mode turned on?
  
  That's a damn good question!

It's interesting
I moved to another part of the country for a change of pace. I just managed to buy a house here, I'm a couple of months into an entirely new job, my fiancée and I are making a few plans for our wedding (which will still be a while away)
It hasn't been easy, but it's worth it
I'm in a beautiful place, I get to see amazing views every day that I work, I have a sound financial position, a woman I love deeply and things are pretty damned good
I hope all of you are as lucky

Yep

But the year's only just star... ohhhh whoops.
Pretty interesting so far, left a job for the first time due to burnout only to get a significant step up in role.... to team who are pretty much similarly overworked. Will try to stick it out for the CV, at least the new CEO seems to have his head screwed on properly.
Externally, lots of scary news about the rise of Reform and the lack of mainstream alternatives here is sad but I also started volunteering for the Green Party. Just leafletdropping as I thought I should try to do something positive politically