Crying outside my old primary school.

LegacyUser

Had a weird encounter this evening and I think it reflects wider problems in my life so I guess I'm looking for advice. I'm 26, and my old primary school is 15 minutes walk from my house. I often go for evening walks and pass by it without even noticing it.

For some reason, I decided to walk up the long avenue towards it. I stood outside the gates and all of a sudden felt an overwhelming feeling that's hard to describe. It was a strong sense of nostalgia, of a time I was happy in. And yet there was a lot of sadness too. Sadness that I'm not an innocent kid anymore with not many cares in the world. Sadness at how 15 years have passed since I left there; a strange kind of sense that barely any time had passed at all hit me. Tears began streaming down my face. I left.

Reflecting back on it, when I was in 6th class was probably the last time I felt truly content. I had lots of friends, I was rarely lonely, life was nice. There have been periods in between where life has improved. In my junior cert year, I felt happy with many good friends, but then my school closed down.

When I was 18, I fell in love, really overwhelmingly strong love. It lasted 3 years, and for the first 1 and a half years, life was bliss. But she ended it in 2012. Then, in 2013/2014, I found friends and met lots of new people again. And now, three years later, the isolation and loneliness is stronger than ever.

I don't know what to do really. It's like my life oscillates between feeling like I have people to socialize with, to be happy with, to periods where my situation looks bleak and I'm wasting my youth feeling miserable.

All of this leads to a strong connectivity with the past. I still often think about my ex even though it ended 5 years ago, which is a bit pathetic if you look at it objectively. This looking backwards accumulates a lot of regret within me, and it call came flying out today.

I'm not sure what advice I need here but any feedback at all to make sense of this would be nice. Is crying outside my old school jsut because I was there a bit ridiculous? I certainly think so.

Mycroft H

Heya!

Good on you on speaking about it. I wouldn't say it's silly getting a bit upset at past memories, somethings triggering it when you're at a bit of a current low point. Have you thought about speaking to a professional? A psychotherapist or perhaps your GP? I went through a rough spot with loneliness at a similar age and having a chat with a professional did help me a bit. It helped sort out some pretty negative thoughts at the time.

CPTM

Funnily enough, I was the exact same at age 26. I'm not saying my experience is your experience, but thought I'd leave it here in case it helped.

I mentioned it to a GP and he said he went through the same. 26-30 is almost like another adolescence, like as if the body and mind are growing into the next phase of life, either naturally or through pressures in your environment. For example, there's slightly more pressure to settle down and have something more solid in terms of relationships ("So are you dating anyone these days?!" from all angles), there's more career pressure, and there's also pressures at home when you see those parents or guardians growing old and no longer as strong as they used to be when you might have needed them as a fall back option in the past. It's no wonder you cast you mind back to a time where those pressures were no where to be seen. This is a common theme throughout actual adolescence as well, it's the brains way of taking a holiday from the pressures of the next stage.

But in the same way as you cannot believe in Santa and fall in love, we need to leave behind certain chapters to experience to full value of the next stage. The pressures and stresses you feel today come with a lot of opportunities that you could not have enjoyed in 6th class. In order to get to 36 without regrets, the trick is to see what opportunities you have now that might disappear in the next 10 years. Time, independence, money, immediate family, physical fitness. Use these as much as you can.

The "first love" piece is the most difficult piece to get through, and whoever comes up with that solution should bottle it and sell it. My own view is that it is important to have that experience in order to be qualified to meet the love of your life. You are simply not ready to meet them until you've felt first hand the consequences of what it is like to be hurt, and this is so that the boundaries are clear in your head and you never become the person who explores them to the deficit of your ultimate better half.

Today I spend my time looking for opportunities that I will some day no longer have. I travel, I go out, I join clubs, I hang around my mates and spend a lot of energy getting to know my family. You're still so young, and you have the best of things yet to come. I recommend getting back to the basics of being 26, and know that those luxuries won't be around forever. Someday a new set of opportunities will come along to replace the old ones, so use them while you have them and face forward.

sashafierce

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ManOfMystery

Totally normal OP. My grandmother died last year, and the wake was held at her (rural) house where I spent the first 5yrs of my life as my mother & I lived there until her and my father could afford to build their own house. I spent a lot of subsequent time visiting there up until I was 12 or so and my grandmother had a stroke, after which point she went into a home but the house was kept for other family.

I hadn't been back for a long time and had an overwhelming sentimental feel of nostalgia upon seeing areas where I used to play as a child. Made me feel quite emotional too, and yes, there was a slight feeling of wishing I could return to that simple time where you had no responsibilities and marveled at everything.

Parchment

I got really emotional when i visited the city i went to university in. I walked around where i used to walk with my boyfriend i had when i lived there. I got really upset thinking of what could have been, of how much time has passed and how i missed being so carefree.

OP i think its normal and dont be afraid of those feelings. Its just weird when they come out of nowhere.

freshpopcorn

Often especially over in After Hours you read posts about their school days being terrible and awful but in all honestly I had the complete opposite experience.
Whilst I'm fairly happy now OP, I often look at especially my primary school days and look back at them and think about how perfect they were.
The only conclusion I can come to is that back then anything felt possible and my worries were generally easily fixed and now as an adult things are different.
I can get terrible nostalgic as well even watching old TV programs from the early 2000's I say to myself how everything was different back then.
I just remember the good things in my life now.