Important forum news

[Veggiewolf]

This forum helped me through a rough spot and I really appreciate it and the people here ❤️ thanks

[kaitwalla]

Cross-posting interest barometer in new forums: viewtopic.php?f=29&t=16152.

[MianaAncrath]

Thanks for understanding everyone.

As a note, I have closed registration to new members.

[Yotey]

I am sad to hear this, and I want to thank everyone who has worked on this forum. It was such wonderful personal support as I left my unhealthy relationship and moved back home. These days, I am happily engaged with a lovely person, and the skills and words I learned here are a huge part of my journey to this place in my life.

Thank you to everyone here. I am sure it was a complex decision, and I hope you have wonderful things coming next!

[capableness]

I’ve been unable to log on for a while, as my device didn’t remember my password.

This is truly gutting news. This forum and it’s members have helped so many through dark times, and will be very greatly missed.

[itsmeitscathy]

Like everyone else, I'm really sorry to read this. However, I can understand why it's the right decision. It is better to end after 10 glorious years where this site has been a core community in so many people's lives, than to stretch it past its time, until it's a shadow of itself.

I want to give my hot take: I think this is a roaring success story. I know that when I joined in 2014ish, I was very poor with boundaries and adult communication, and even believing my own version of events. Over the years, I've realised most of my I Need Helps here have been essentially "My intuition knows what I want to do, but I need to hear it from someone else, because I am incapable of feeling that it's OK to do what I want."

And there has been great advice and great community, the has been a big part of my life, for a decade.

But I have found that as I get better at implementing the cores of advice from this community, I feel less inclined to come to the forums. I wish that I had been able to give more as a Helper as well as a Helpee, but I found that when I was increasingly in a good headspace, my old problems became anathema to me.

I couldn't understand problems that used to be familiar to me, like overthinking minor interactions, or being too willing to coddle abusers, or feeling unable to leave a situation I didn't like. Those are really big problems for a lot of people, but I wonder if so many of our members eventually got enough help that we no longer had these problems at anything like the same frequency?

The healthier my heads pace was, the more difficult it was to know how to advise other people with problems that Old Me had. It could even be painful to come to a place basically centred on problems when I was building my new, different life. I wanted to come here to help other people, but the old Itsmeitscathy doesn't live here anymore.

When I have seen that former familiar name from here hasn't been online since 2016, I really tend to imagine that they no longer need the support of strangers on the Internet, and while it's sad to lose touch, it's great when people can make that step.

Maybe I'm projecting, but this is the case for me: like a good therapist, you helped me so much that I don't want to come to therapy anymore.

Thank you all so, so much for modding and posting over the years.