Today's a new day.

[elephantnose3334]

No person who has read more than one of your threads can miss that you think your parents are too strict. Nor can they miss that you're angry and frustrated. We all need to vent sometimes, but you are non stop complaining about people we don't know, and whose side of the story we are unaware of. The forum isn't a diary.
Take a deep breath here, The people who read you are interested in what you are learning about the aquarium world. You have ideas. Mom, Dad and parents are key words you should delete if you type. If you don't get your own way, maybe you don't need to tell us so often. Things change. Keep learning, keep sharing the positive and people will read you and talk with you as a 17 year old person.

Oh, okay. This thread is a diary of myself, but not the whole forum. I have a problem with my family. Sorry about that @GaryE. I will not focus on the parents anymore. I will focus on what I like, fishkeeping.

 

[elephantnose3334]

Shifting away from the parents, and focusing exclusively on fishkeeping. Thanks @CaptainBarnicles and @GaryE for advice. I can get upset due to various reasons. I get upset because I do the wrong thing. Now let's focus on fishkeeping as per Gary's advice. I'm trying to be a good person... Sometimes, I need help, lots of help. It may take a while to move on from the parents, but I'll move on from them eventually. I need to calm down because I have a few issues with myself.

 

[AdoraBelle Dearheart]

Hi @Colin_T, @AdoraBelle Dearheart and everyone else watching the thread, can you tell me a good, uplifting story about your fish please? Feeling a bit down today presumably because of an earlier argument between me and the parents. I need to keep company in the forum. I need storytime to make me happy again. I know I'm a 17 yo, but I'm young and brave at heart with a dislike of strict parents.

I'm afraid I don't have any happy, uplifting stories right now, I'm sorry. I'm dealing with a lot of hard and painful grown up stuff right now, but I am genuinely sorry that you're feeling down too. It's okay to feel down sometimes.

I love @Seisage 's story though! Now that's someone who wants the best for the fish that wound up in her care, and is planning carefully a new set up that will benefit the fish she currently has in her care, and has worked hard to give him the best care he can possibly have while setting up a better long term solution for him. That's a wonderful story!

I do have happier hobby stories, I'm sure, I'm just in a mental space to find them in my memory and share them right now, but I will when the time is right and I can.

However, I agree wholeheartedly with @CaptainBarnicles , you'd do well to listen to her.

No. Your parents will not allow it...getting hostile with your parents will not change their minds about it either. A mature person does not behave like you are when they are told 'no'. They simply accept the decision made and move on without an argument even if they feel upset and frustrated. It is acceptable to feel upset and frustrated, it is not acceptable to show hostility towards your parents and argue with them when you don't get your own way.

My advice to you is to stop hyperfocusing on all these other projects and concentrate instead on doing what your parents are asking of you.

Yeah, I understand that, @CaptainBarnicles. I get upset due to the deal made by the parents. I do not like strict parents who try to strip my hobby away. But I will focus on your advice, Captain.

I haven't read all of your posting history, since I've been AWOL from the forum for a long time.

But, your parents are not trying to prevent you from enjoying your hobby, or laying down rules for no reason. The aquarium hobby can be very expensive, especially once you're running multiple tanks, buying live plants, equipment, expensive shrimp etc, and I'm guessing your parents are paying for all of the current tanks, fish, and any future ones you have planned?

The fact is that they have encouraged you in your hobby. You guys have more than one tank already, right? You've also mentioned other hobbies they've helped you with, that you then lost interest in. Your dad has helped you with every water change with your current tanks. So they have supported you in exploring your hobbies. They have merely set limits, and from what I've seen so far, they're perfectly acceptable limits.

You're currently not doing much with your current tanks except feeding the fish. The hard work and maintenance of those tanks has been left for your parents to do. This is why we were all encouraging you to learn how to, and take over, maintaining your current tanks yourself, before planning more and more new tanks and critters. If you cannot maintain your current tanks, then it's not right to set up new ones, let expect your parents to pay for more new tanks that they will then have to do the real hard work on to maintain.

It can make it hard to see it from their point of view. But from an outsiders point of view, they are doing a lot to support your current hobby, and are trying to teach you how to manage your hobby yourself, while you're getting carried away with enjoying the planning part of it, and not yet stepping up to take over maintaining the current tanks.

Being mad and resentful about your parents rules won't get you anywhere. It's pretty normal not to necessarily like their rules, and for teens to argue with their parents! But at the end of the day, it is their house, they can set the rules, and in general, parents set rules for good reasons, even if you cannot see the reasons yourself just yet.

If you wish to be successful in this hobby, and I absolutely believe that you can be - pour your energy and work into the tanks you currently have. You have the hobby right there in those tanks. Getting more tanks and other set ups won't make you a better hobbyist. Learning how to maintain, clean, water change, and stock your current tanks will.

 

[elephantnose3334]

Let's focus on the good things. Breathe in, breathe out. Calming myself down currently. As calm as a cucumber. Focus on fishkeeping, not the bad stuff... I make mistakes all the time, and it happens in the forum too. Some mistakes happen over time.

I'm afraid I don't have any happy, uplifting stories right now, I'm sorry. I'm dealing with a lot of hard and painful grown up stuff right now, but I am genuinely sorry that you're feeling down too. It's okay to feel down sometimes.

I love @Seisage 's story though! Now that's someone who wants the best for the fish that wound up in her care, and is planning carefully a new set up that will benefit the fish she currently has in her care, and has worked hard to give him the best care he can possibly have while setting up a better long term solution for him. That's a wonderful story!

I do have happier hobby stories, I'm sure, I'm just in a mental space to find them in my memory and share them right now, but I will when the time is right and I can.

However, I agree wholeheartedly with @CaptainBarnicles , you'd do well to listen to her.




I haven't read all of your posting history, since I've been AWOL from the forum for a long time. But I think I saw you mention somewhere that you're on the autism spectrum? If you'd rather not discuss it I completely understand, that's personal info, and no one else's business unless you chose to share, so I'm not trying to be invasive or demand to know your personal medical or mental health conditions.

But I did spend some years working with people on the autism spectrum, and have a brother on the spectrum, so have some insight. One key component of autism spectrum is difficulty with what's called "theory of mind". Means that it can be harder for you to put yourself in your parents minds, and understand that their perspective is different from yours. That can make it hard for neurotypicals and people with a nuerodivergence to understand each other, and lead to arguments that can become difficult to resolve.

But, your parents are not trying to prevent you from enjoying your hobby, or laying down rules for no reason. The aquarium hobby can be very expensive, especially once you're running multiple tanks, buying live plants, equipment, expensive shrimp etc, and I'm guessing your parents are paying for all of the current tanks, fish, and any future ones you have planned?

The fact is that they have encouraged you in your hobby. You guys have more than one tank already, right? You've also mentioned other hobbies they've helped you with, that you then lost interest in. Your dad has helped you with every water change with your current tanks. So they have supported you in exploring your hobbies. They have merely set limits, and from what I've seen so far, they're perfectly acceptable limits.

You're currently not doing much with your current tanks except feeding the fish. The hard work and maintenance of those tanks has been left for your parents to do. This is why we were all encouraging you to learn how to, and take over, maintaining your current tanks yourself, before planning more and more new tanks and critters. If you cannot maintain your current tanks, then it's not right to set up new ones, let expect your parents to pay for more new tanks that they will then have to do the real hard work on to maintain.

Autism can make it hard to see it from their point of view. But from an outsiders point of view, they are doing a lot to support your current hobby, and are trying to teach you how to manage your hobby yourself, while you're getting carried away with enjoying the planning part of it, and not yet stepping up to take over maintaining the current tanks.

Being mad and resentful about your parents rules won't get you anywhere. It's pretty normal not to necessarily like their rules, and for teens to argue with their parents! But at the end of the day, it is their house, they can set the rules, and in general, parents set rules for good reasons, even if you cannot see the reasons yourself just yet.

If you wish to be successful in this hobby, and I absolutely believe that you can be - pour your energy and work into the tanks you currently have. You have the hobby right there in those tanks. Getting more tanks and other set ups won't make you a better hobbyist. Learning how to maintain, clean, water change, and stock your current tanks will.

I completely understand your advice now. Yes, I am in the spectrum, but not discussing about my disability in the forum. I haven't made the shrimp tank yet. Let's focus on fishkeeping instead. I am learning every day.

 

[elephantnose3334]

I now understand peoples' advice on the thread. I understand that the hobby can get expensive at times, but I always save money on a project. Saving money is a good thing for me. I have some depressing moments regarding myself. I will try not to ruin my own thread. Advice is good and I am here to take it. I agree on advice that is helpful for me. @GaryE, I am trying to be a good person and wanting to focus on the good side of life. Life sucks currently, but I'll make it to the end. Issues happen, but I'll get there.

 

[GaryE]

@elephantnose3334 You will. One thing you may want to work on is appropriateness. It's not considered nice behaviour to talk negatively about people who can't defend themselves, and since your parents are not forum members, complaining about them makes you look very immature. It doesn't mean that you are. But what we say matters.
There are certainly people here who are going through terrible times with divorces, breakups, bosses, crimes... but they don't come here to complain about them. They come here to escape from that world and spend time in the peaceful world of fishkeeping.
Members can have bad things happen in their lives, and other members will support them through the difficult times. Then they turn around and offer help to others. But that is usually for crisis, life and death situations.
I have students who are refugees, one of whom has terrible, barely healed head injuries from the war in the Ukraine. And yet, on this forum, it is as if that hard world doesn't exist. We don't discuss wars, politics and fights with people in our personal lives. It isn't appropriate here.

 

[elephantnose3334]

Being a good person is hard sometimes, but with great advice and motivation, it can be easier. I need to do some work on focusing on stuff. Motivation is what I'm lacking currently. Advice is all I need for now on. Recovering from stress from tonight.

@elephantnose3334 You will. One thing you may want to work on is appropriateness. It's not considered nice behaviour to talk negatively about people who can't defend themselves, and since your parents are not forum members, complaining about them makes you look very immature. It doesn't mean that you are. But what we say matters.
There are certainly people here who are going through terrible times with divorces, breakups, bosses, crimes... but they don't come here to complain about them. They come here to escape from that world and spend time in the peaceful world of fishkeeping.
Members can have bad things happen in their lives, and other members will support them through the difficult times. Then they turn around and offer help to others. But that is usually for crisis, life and death situations.
I have students who are refugees, one of whom has terrible, barely healed head injuries from the war in the Ukraine. And yet, on this forum, it is as if that hard world doesn't exist. We don't discuss wars, politics and fights with people in our personal lives. It isn't appropriate here.

I understand the rules now. I'm trying to be an appropriate person in the forum. That's what I'm working on. I just stopped focusing on the parent situation and will not discuss about them anymore. I have to agree with you @GaryE. I'm trying not to make the thread a bad one. I make mistakes and I move on from them. I'm also trying not to interfere the rules and trying to make the thread more family-friendly.

 

[AdoraBelle Dearheart]

Let's focus on the good things. Breathe in, breathe out. Calming myself down currently.

This is good! And I'm working on doing the same.

I make mistakes all the time, and it happens in the forum too. Some mistakes happen over time.

I completely understand your advice now. Yes, I am in the spectrum, but not discussing about my disability in the forum.

Completely understand, and I'll edit or delete that post if you'd like me to? That is your personal business, and while you're welcome to share (heck, if you read my current thread about my mum's passing, I certainly share everything about how I'm feeling!) it's definitely also worth remembering that this is a public forum anyone can read, so you don't want to share info on the public threads if you'd prefer for it to remain private. Absolutely understandably.

I'll go ahead and edit my previous post to remove that part actually.

I have some depressing moments regarding myself. I will try not to ruin my own thread.

You're not ruining anything, please don't tell yourself that.

Advice is good and I am here to take it. I agree on advice that is helpful for me. [...] and wanting to focus on the good side of life. Life sucks currently, but I'll make it to the end. Issues happen, but I'll get there.

You're handling this with a lot of maturity now. You're right, mistakes happen, life can seem to suck at times, but there are always also positives! We can focus on changing the things we can, and doing our best each day. That's all anyone can do, and all anyone can expect of any of us! It's okay to make mistakes, to sometimes have arguments that make us feel awful, but no one is perfect, things like this happen in life, and we're not defined by our mistakes or the hard times in life. They happen to us all at times, and it's how we handle them that matters. You're accepting advice and trying to move forward in a positive direction, and that's great!

I am trying to be a good person

This part does worry me a bit, because it's not the first time I've seen you say something similar. Just want you to know that making mistakes, or even doing something bad, doesn't mean that you're a bad person. It's good to strive to be a good person, of course. But I want you to know that who you are as a person isn't defined by making mistakes, or arguments, or learning and changing as you grow up. You're still only a teen, learning what you like, who you want to be, what your interests and values are. That's okay, normal, and doesn't make you a bad person, okay? I'd like for you to stop telling yourself you're a bad person if you make a mistake, or do something wrong. Good people make mistakes, have arguments, and even do bad things now and then, but it doesn't necessarily mean they're a bad person. We can work on our mistakes, make amends when we do something wrong, and that counts.

People are complicated, and don't fit easily into "good" or "bad" boxes. Nearly all of us have a mix of both, and can do both good and bad things. The difference is in if you're trying to do better and be the best you you can be. From here, you don't seem like a bad person at all. Believe me, all the people replying to you here, like myself, captain barnacles, Gary and Seisage wouldn't bother to take the time to reply and type all this out if we thought you were a bad person.

So be kind to yourself.

 

[elephantnose3334]

I'm a bit shy currently and trying to focus on the good things. It's okay to be shy and it may take a while to focus on the good things. Accepting advice from others and will focus on the shrimp tank, but first, focus on the current fish I have. Be kind to myself. Struggles happen every day.

@GaryE, you're a former teacher, right? A teacher would be a nice job, but I think I am not fit for the role. Is being a teacher a good role model for a person like me? Can you help me gain some motivation please? I understand that teaching can be difficult for some people, but teachers are good people to have around. In my old primary school (I graduated Year 6), there are now fish tanks on the kindy building and some classrooms. There used to be no fish tanks in my primary school. And that primary school is less than a km away from my home. Teachers know their stuff. Year 12 is coming up and I have new horizons coming on my way.

 

[elephantnose3334]

This is good! And I'm working on doing the same.

Completely understand, and I'll edit or delete that post if you'd like me to? That is your personal business, and while you're welcome to share (heck, if you read my current thread about my mum's passing, I certainly share everything about how I'm feeling!) it's definitely also worth remembering that this is a public forum anyone can read, so you don't want to share info on the public threads if you'd prefer for it to remain private. Absolutely understandably.

I'll go ahead and edit my previous post to remove that part actually.


You're not ruining anything, please don't tell yourself that.


You're handling this with a lot of maturity now. You're right, mistakes happen, life can seem to suck at times, but there are always also positives! We can focus on changing the things we can, and doing our best each day. That's all anyone can do, and all anyone can expect of any of us! It's okay to make mistakes, to sometimes have arguments that make us feel awful, but no one is perfect, things like this happen in life, and we're not defined by our mistakes or the hard times in life. They happen to us all at times, and it's how we handle them that matters. You're accepting advice and trying to move forward in a positive direction, and that's great!


This part does worry me a bit, because it's not the first time I've seen you say something similar. Just want you to know that making mistakes, or even doing something bad, doesn't mean that you're a bad person. It's good to strive to be a good person, of course. But I want you to know that who you are as a person isn't defined by making mistakes, or arguments, or learning and changing as you grow up. You're still only a teen, learning what you like, who you want to be, what your interests and values are. That's okay, normal, and doesn't make you a bad person, okay? I'd like for you to stop telling yourself you're a bad person if you make a mistake, or do something wrong. Good people make mistakes, have arguments, and even do bad things now and then, but it doesn't necessarily mean they're a bad person. We can work on our mistakes, make amends when we do something wrong, and that counts.

People are complicated, and don't fit easily into "good" or "bad" boxes. Nearly all of us have a mix of both, and can do both good and bad things. The difference is in if you're trying to do better and be the best you you can be. From here, you don't seem like a bad person at all. Believe me, all the people replying to you here, like myself, captain barnacles, Gary and Seisage wouldn't bother to take the time to reply and type all this out if we thought you were a bad person.

So be kind to yourself.

I am fully calm now. I can focus on the good things now. Took probably an hour to calm down completely. I am afraid that bad things may happen to me again. Motivation is growing, people giving advice for me and mistakes made by myself. I want to be the best I can be, and as a student, I am actively listening to advice. People do like me, and that's a good thing. Believing in success is a great thing for my mental health. I like the forum.

The tetras are doing fine and now resting. I will see them in the morning. Fed them the second time earlier.

 

[GaryE]

You are not a bad person. I don't think you do bad things. You haven't talked about any!

Sometimes, we need to figure out what is right to do on one place, and not right in another. A forum is a bit like a giant community aquarium! We are all weird fish with our own natural histories, and in our heads, we have our own biotopes.

When I was a teacher, I worked with all kinds of different people, some of whom were having a very hard time with the kinds of things you talk about. You are not alone. The forum rules are because we are all different. We have different minds. We come from different countries, cultures and generations... we really could have some spectacular fights if we didn't agree to cooperate so we can learn about aquariums. The forum rules are for everyone, and not for you alone.

Sometimes you react like think people are trying to make things difficult. It's the opposite - we want them to be easy. If any of us break the forum rules, a moderator will talk to us too.

Here's a thought. When you get mad and post a lot about parents with rules - many of us are parents with rules in our own families. So it makes sense we won't agree with what you say. But we don't want to fight with you, so we often say nothing. That's hard. Remember that and make it easier!

 

[elephantnose3334]

You are not a bad person. I don't think you do bad things. You haven't talked about any!

Sometimes, we need to figure out what is right to do on one place, and not right in another. A forum is a bit like a giant community aquarium! We are all weird fish with our own natural histories, and in our heads, we have our own biotopes.

When I was a teacher, I worked with all kinds of different people, some of whom were having a very hard time with the kinds of things you talk about. You are not alone. The forum rules are because we are all different. We have different minds. We come from different countries, cultures and generations... we really could have some spectacular fights if we didn't agree to cooperate so we can learn about aquariums. The forum rules are for everyone, and not for you alone.

Sometimes you react like think people are trying to make things difficult. It's the opposite - we want them to be easy. If any of us break the forum rules, a moderator will talk to us too.

Here's a thought. When you get mad and post a lot about parents with rules - many of us are parents with rules in our own families. So it makes sense we won't agree with what you say. But we don't want to fight with you, so we often say nothing. That's hard. Remember that and make it easier!

Thank you for some motivation. How long have you been a teacher? I am curious because you mentioned that before. Year 12 is my final year as a student and we're learning through. Sorry for getting up super early, I will go back to sleep again.

 

[MattW]

I'm a bit shy currently and trying to focus on the good things. It's okay to be shy and it may take a while to focus on the good things.

When I left school I didn't have much social confidence. I got a job in a small supermarket after college it helped massively for my confidence and the money was always a bonus . It allowed me to become confident in myself and open up new opportunities for me. It also allowed me to save up for this hobby. Currently on my 3rd tank and the biggest yet! That was all made possible from that job.

 

[elephantnose3334]

It's Saturday. I am much less stressed than last night. I got up at 2:30am but gone back to sleep again. I am up at 9:40am. Focus, calm and motivation are all I need. I am also working on appropriateness too. Gary gave me some good motivation yesterday night. The best thing about teachers are they usually are helpful to students. I am still a student, but with a focus on the fishkeeping hobby. School is coming on 4 days, so getta get ready for it.

As for my tetras, I will feed them now. I used to procrastinate, but not anymore with some good advice from Adora. I am a proud fishkeeper who cares for the existing and future inhabitants.

 

[elephantnose3334]

It's the afternoon and everything's okay currently. I'm not ready for the 10.6L project just yet, but I will do it a few weeks later. Focusing on the good side of the hobby. I am a good person, not a bad person. Patience.