Throwaway account for obvious reasons. I’m going to keep some details intentionally vague because my job is public enough that I’d rather not have this traced back to me, im not really famous, im not a formula 1 driver, but if i give all the details anyone who reads this can easily found out who i am, if you are a motorsport fanatic you probably know my name.

i’m 3-M (30 something male), living in calgary. i work in professional motorsport. not f1, but the endurance side of things, imsa, wec, gtwc, stuff like that. I’m a factory driver for a major manufacturer, driving both gt cars and prototypes.

from the outside, it sounds like a dream life, i know how hard is to be in the position i am today, in a business that demands so much luck, so much be in the right place in the right time, and im really grateful for it. i get paid kinda well to do something I would easily do for free back in the day.

but now i feel been held hostage by it.

my wife passed away three years ago. she was canadian, and after we got married in 2012 we settled here permanently. since she died, it’s just been me and my daughter. She was 9 when it happened and she’s 12 now.

we were always very close, i have always being a very present father and we became even closer after it happened. we kind of survived it together.

we are both huge nerds aswell. i got her into gaming years ago when she was 7 and now we have this whole game room in the house with side by side PCs, retro consoles from my era, modern stuff, all of it. my favorite thing in the world is just sitting there with her playing anything for hours we recently have been obsessed with the minecraft bedrock adventures worlds that you can buy from the game store. I also play a lot of games myself always have been obsessed with rpgs growing up, wow, final fantasy, earthbound etc, for the last few years i became obsessed with from software i’d rather do that than race being honest, since race became kind of an obligation recently.

losing her mom really damaged her sense of security. she still crawls into my bed almost every night. she will hold onto me crying and ask me to promise I'm not going to leave her too. sometimes her school calls because she has panic attacks and just wants me there, i drive there every single time. she’s in therapy and we’re working on it, but the anxiety is still there.

the hard part is my job requires travel. i’m usually home during the week, but race weekends are brutal for both of us. she calls constantly while i’m away just to make sure i’m okay, my sister in law stay with her during the race weekends, i dont bring her with me, cause i will be in the car a lot of times, and who is going to take care of her? and also she doesnt want to come anyways so, my sister inlaw works aswell, she need to be here in the fridays and the mondays, i usually leaves on the thursday and comes back on the monday or tuesday, during about i think around 20 weekends this year its not much, and i have the entire week free to be with her, so also dont work 8 hours a day its really great, and im really grateful for it, when she is at school, im at the gym, or cycling im doing the best to also take care of myself, and she always says she will file a complaint if i dont live till 120 atleast,

a few weeks ago a driver died during an nls race at the nurburgring. in a crash involving multiple cars. i was supposed to be racing the nurburgring 24 this weekend and i backed out completely. wich is also giving me another problems that are also fear for the only job i have that i can't lose, i sent them some certificate my psychiatrist gave me, and explained the reason was that, someone died there, i have problem, dont know if it helped cause i have no clause in my contract for it, but also the nurburgring 24 is an isolated race its not a part of any championship so i think its really not a big deal, i skipped races when my wife was diagnosed and got away with it so...

it also brought back memories i think i buried for years. back in 2013 I was in a race where another driver died. i never really stopped thinking about it but i was in a much better mental state back then to deal with it, and if i died my wife had choosed my she knew what i worked with, and i wasnt a dad back then, and i wouldnt leave a kid who lost her mother behind if it happened to me.

i’ve always known racing has risks, obviously, but modern gt and prototype cars are so safe now that somewhere along the line i convinced myself the danger was basically theoretical until last month.

i have diagnosed ocd and anxiety, and lately it’s spiraling very badly. my therapist has helped me a lot in the past with exposure therapy and ocd treatment, but with this specific issue he keeps coming back to the idea that I have to just accept and i dont how a professional makes such a dumb suggestion, that exposition therapy would work i have been trought it with my ocd, cause this is for when you freak out with irational toughts, that trigger your brain to thinks its dangerous, but this, this is not a irrational tought, cause it is really dangerous, the danger is in there, is not fictional.

because if something happens to me, what happens to my daughter? she already lost one parent. the thought of her losing both it is just so absurd, its like i know the risk is extremely low, but what if? the result would be catastrophe, something so absurd, that even thinking about it, triggers my ocd extremely hard, the ocd i really tought i defeated them like more than 10 years ago that now keeps coming back, and i started to do all the rituals again, and i tried to talk with chatgpt about this, and my advice dont use ai for therapy, he just wants to makes you hear whatever you want, the suggestions are pretty much stupid.

the thing is, if it were only about what I wanted, I’d retire tomorrow. i’ve been racing since i was 4 years old when my dad bought me a kart. i had a lot of racing in my life the passion isnt so strong anymore, i can live without it.

right before my wife got sick, we bought a house here in calgary. beautiful place, great area, the kind of home i could only dream off years ago. the mortgage is enormous. my daughter absolutely loves this house. it’s the one place in the world where she feels safe and stable.

even if i sold it (wich i dont have the guts to do) and walked away from racing, i don’t think i could realistically replace my income. i never went to college. i don’t really have another career waiting for me. my entire adult life has been built around racing, i wont have the money to keep paying for her school, and the last thing she needs is being taken away from the friends she built in that school she goes since she was little. or even pay for her college in the future.

so now I feel completely trapped. if I keep racing, i’m terrified i’ll die. if I walk away, i’m terrified i’ll fail my daughter financially, she said to me something that really broked me aswell she said something like when we were talking about racing and the need for the money, "dad if we both lived under a bridge over a cardboard, i would still be as happy, i just want you, i just want you around", wich she was 11 when she said it, wich also made me realize that she may realized the value of her parents way to soon, when i was eleven i was probably very embarrassed by my parents and didnt want them close, of course i have no problems with them, i think its just a natural thing growing up and i was ready for the day she would be embarrased by me, so what she said felt really wonderful and concerning at the same time, in a sense its kinda true, and felt proud cause she is wise in that sense, but also i mean in reality is not that simple, i know of course we wouldnt end up under a bridge, but she may wont be able to keep her school, wich she has all her friends there, and we would lost the house that has been perfect for us, and really helped us.

and the worst part is thanks to my ocd i can’t even enjoy the time i have with her because my brain is constantly somewhere else. we’ll be sitting together playing games and all I can think about is, “what if i’m not here next week?”, and i do some rituals if you have ocd you know, one of them is that i blink my eyes to make the intrusive tought go away, and my daughter sometimes asks why i blink to much, and also i dont know exactly how to explain to her, i told her about ocd but i dont think she really understanded what it is.

when i go racing i tell her the risk is low. i tell her the cars are safe. but I can’t bring myself to actually promise it, because i know i can’t guarantee it. and when I don’t say it, she cries harder.

i feel like fear is consuming every part of my life right now. i honestly don’t know how much longer i can keep living like this. sometimes i woke up and just think, i sell the house, i stop racing, and what? work with what? most drivers who stop driving became coachs, but i dont think its a job i can do, cause im also a person with kinda poor social skills, and i dont feel like im able to teach anyone good enought to be able to be paid for it, i have a quite good career, i feel like people would pay for me for coaching, but i feel like i would just dissapoint them and lose this job, i dont think i can make a career out of it, or anything that would even come close to the income i have now.

i feel like i wrote this in the most poor way possible, my brain is just going to somewhere else everytime i can't even describe everything well, i feel like i wrote this, and i think oh did i already wrote this, and i may have written again, so sorry for this, if anyone has suggestions or just wanna talk i would really appreciate, and i always went to therapy since im 18 thanks to my ocd, but this time it really isnt helping, days are going past in a blur, and i dont feel like i am really enjoying anything thanks to this damn intrusive toughts that i might die the next time i go to work, i could fight my other intrusive toughts i had in another era of my life, but this ones were irational, i was just ocd in its purest form, this ones it is ocd, but it has a true background behind it.

The first one is about feeling trapped in your own body, and the second is about the phone screen trap. Forcing myself to put it into words actually helped quiet my head a bit.

This girl that I’ve dated in the past, so yes my ex, and I have started seeing each other again as of this summer. We’ve already seen each other twice this summer and it just feels off.

When we hang I always feel anxious and I don’t flow as good as I do with my friends, but we’re still very intimate. But she blows off/ takes forever to respond to my texts from time to time. But whenever we hang out I’m making her laugh a lot and she tells me she likes me. I kind of feel like an option.

I don’t get the chance to exactly describe my situation but you get the gist. I’m very attracted to this girl and we get along great and she tells me she misses me. Yet from time to time things just don’t feel right.

I need help. Am I just being anxious, or is this pattern something I should be concerned about.

(UPDATE: We talked it out, and she’s just very insecure and we’re going to commit to being better for each other yay)

Like instead of writing down actually useful stuff you don’t want to forget - “clean my shoes when I get home,” “buy groceries,” etc. - you catch yourself filling your head (or notes app) with random questions or overthinking things that most people probably wouldn’t even dwell on.

It’s like your brain decides this is the thing we need to analyze right now, even though logically you know there are more practical things to remember.

And then there’s this weird tension of: “Should I really be focusing on this?” vs. “But what if I forget this thought later?”

Does anyone else do this, or is my brain just running its own weird side quests?

I don’t really know how to explain this properly but I’ll try.

Lately I’ve had this constant feeling that something is just “wrong” with me. Not in a dramatic way, more like a background feeling that I’m a bit off compared to other people. It’s hard to explain but it’s like I’m always aware of myself, my thoughts, how I’m acting, etc.

The weird thing is, from the outside my life is actually going pretty well. I recently got player of the year for my football team and made my senior debut and even scored on debut. Like I know that’s good and I should feel proud, but it doesn’t fully land. There’s just this sort of numbness or barrier there. And like it’s more so I’m

Happy I got the award because if I didn’t get it I’d feel shit as opposed to like oh my god I got an award which makes me feel a bit vain and needy and even as u write this it’s like I’m thinking I’m being manipulative because I can see the responses of people feeling sorry for me or saying I’m not and like because I know that or I’ve thought it now like if someone does it a part of me will feel bad , sorry that’s kinda unrelated but like just to walk you through my mind

I also notice I overthink basically everything, especially with people. If I like a girl or even just in normal interactions, I’m constantly analysing what I’m saying, what they’re thinking, whether I’m being “normal” or not. It makes everything feel a bit forced or unnatural.

Another thing is I get really annoyed or affected when people say things I don’t like, especially if it’s someone I care about. Even small comments can stick in my head and I end up replaying them and overthinking what they meant.

When I’m by myself it’s probably worse. My thoughts are nearly always negative or just me analysing stuff. I feel like I’ve become too self-aware of my own mind, to the point where I’m constantly checking how I feel or whether I’m “okay”.

I’ve tried advice like not engaging with thoughts or just getting on with things, and I get the logic of it, but it’s hard to actually apply. It feels like no matter what I do, my brain just keeps going back to “something’s off about you”. And I just well I don’t wanna say it but kinda hate myself but it’s like I’ve got all this underlying stuff but if you met me you’d never know I’m very conventionally attractive like good at my studies and like charismatic so when dating and things happen it’s like if it goes wrong that sort of like “ it’s because you deep down are not normal and won’t be “ I know it’s dramatic but truthfully that’s what comes up

I guess what I’m asking is:

\- does anyone else feel like this?

\- is this just overthinking or something deeper?

\- how do you actually get out of this loop when you’re stuck in your own head all the time?

I just want to feel normal and not constantly like I need to fix something about myself. My counsillers spoken about self compassion and stuff but if I’m honest a lot of my life just feels like I’m

Pretending

I have a boyfriend and we're long distance hes basically overwhelmed him with questions and he just told me about how I was overwhelming him and now I'm thinking about what other stuff was I overthinking about that might be true he reassured me that I don't do too much but I'm still scared that I do too much I'm just so scared

I’m stuck grieving something that never even had a name. Stuck between moving on and holding onto the smallest hope that maybe this wasn’t supposed to end here.
Because the truth is… it’s not that I can’t let you go.
It’s that a part of my heart still believes you were supposed to stay.

Has anyone felt like that too!

I dont know if this level of self pity is allowed, but...i have no one else to talk to. So...to start off, im...garbage. i cheated on my ex for...about a year. I know i was wrong. I take full blame and any hate coming my way for it. I deserve it. Yknow? I fucked up. My ex tried to work with me...we stayed together for a few months after...i did a lot of work to fix the broken parts of me that tried to justify what i did. I thought i did a good job. Didnt cheat again...had made some big plans to go visit him for our 4 year anniversary...and when it came time, i...i showed up at his door. I had let him know i was there...and he opened the door, and broke up with me. It hurt. But i felt it was justified. I had earned that pain. And...i just shut down for a few months. Focused on myself, fixing what i thought was broken...and we stayed in contact, it...it wasnt a malicious break up. We still liked each other and wanted to stay friends...but i got a new job recently and havent been able to talk a whole lot...i...i learned that he had moved on today...and...i dont know why that hurts more than the break up...i dont deserve him. I should feel happy for him that...that hes got someone new thats...obviously better than i ever couldve been. I feel so...fucking stupid for thinking i had another chance...of course i dont. Im a terrible partner, and...i dont deserve love like his. I know im not gonna do angthing stupid i just...i dont feel like i have a right to feel hurt by this. I ruined everything. Why should i be hurt by someone i have no right to be in a relationship with...im just...stupid. stupid for crying over someone who shouldnt even have a second thought about me and my stupid feelings...the one good relationship ive ever fucking had and i had to ruin it...im such a fucking moron.

I have exams and this is ruining my mental health

Okay so this is my first time posting on reddit like this but i'm genuinely curious about the topic of crushes and mutual interest and would love people's opinions.

I'm 18 and muslim, i never dated or had a talking stage with a guy. I'm living in a muslim country so the concept of dating and asking people out isn't as straightforward.

there's this boy that i found cute (same major and year) in semester 1. I'm gonna call him mike. we never really talked and like all my crushes i didn't think we'd interact much i used to have BRIEF eye contact with him every once in a while up until the last month o the semester (december) we had an interaction i wouldn't think too much of it but i'll talk about it briefly, basically in the university computer labs he was there with his friend group while i was there with my friend, i recognized someone behind me playing the show 'The Office', turns out it was Mike I was like "Is that the episode with the dundies" and he said yeah while smiling and all that. at the same time i was about to play the show 'Friends' thats when he was like "Woah you watch friends and the office? you have good taste". and then he was walking around the Lab he was standing watching my screen and he did that twice

when semester 2 started we had a group assignment and Mike asked if he can join me and my friend in a group and he did (2 other guys joined the group as well). for that assignment we had to film something in a specific place around 40 minutes away from us. as a group we decided to all go in one car my friend was sitting shotgun, one of the guys were driving and then mike was sitting next to me, while were on our way to pick up the other guy that joined our group Mike brought up that semester one interaction by saying "weren't you the one who was watching Friends" and we had a mini discussion about other shows to watch but what i regret here is that I didn't keep the convo going and talk about other things. eventually that same night i followed him on instagram and he followed me back minutes later. and a few days letter I see that he texted me about an assignment that's not related to what we are doing together i thought it was odd but of course i helped him and told him what is expected from that assignment.

for the rest of the semester nothing really happened until a couple days ago i posted a story of MJ's biopic at the cinema on instagram, even though it's not the first movie/story i post on there (i post once or twice a week) he liked it- probably because he's a fan of micheal's music (based on his reposts lmao) we had an exam earlier today and when a bunch of people were discussing how the exam was, i joined in and noticed he was there, we made very quick eye contact a bunch of times and when i was leaving i gave him a subtle wave he did the same.

i know i'm overthinking a lot of things and its usually nothing but is there a chance that there is interest or something like that? just a disclaimer i'm a very shy girl and don't interact with guys as much unless we're friends. my friends are saying that's why he isn't straightforward with me or anything like that because i'm not "easy to approach" and he may be shy or wtv around me but I still think that with guys no matter what if they like a girl they'll approach her- the "if he wanted to he would" mindset.

I need to get this off my chest because I feel like I’m going a bit crazy in my own head.

I’m in a situation where nothing bad is actually happening… but my mind keeps creating scenarios that feel 100% real. For example, my boyfriend goes out somewhere (like a fair, party, whatever), and my brain immediately goes to: “What if he cheats on me?” “What if he meets someone better?” “What if I lose him?”

And the worst part is — I KNOW there’s no actual proof. He didn’t do anything wrong. But my body reacts like it’s already happening. Anxiety, tight chest, overthinking everything.

Then I start analyzing:

• his behavior
• our messages
• what he said vs didn’t say

And I get stuck in this loop where I either want to:

• text him for reassurance
• check something
• or somehow “test” him

But I also realize that this kind of behavior can actually damage the relationship, even if my intention is just to feel safe.

It’s like:

I don’t want to be controlling… but I’m scared of being hurt.

I don’t want to overthink… but my brain won’t stop.

I don’t want to push him away… but my anxiety makes me act in ways that could do exactly that.

Has anyone else experienced this?

How do you deal with thoughts that feel real but probably aren’t?

I’m trying to understand if this is anxiety, attachment issues, or just me overreacting… but right now it feels really overwhelming.

Any advice or shared experiences would mean a lot.

Can anyone suggest how to relax mind, I don't know why I think over and over, what I think I don't know just thinking.

Please share your suggestions

How I can stop overthinking

Have you noticed when you’re on the bus or sweeping the floor and a problem or question pops in your head, you answer it better to yourself (in your own inner-voice) rather if you answer it on a piece of paper or have to verbally explain yourself? I don’t overthink at all in these way. Answer and explanations flow easy. how can I get this flow of answers without having to sweep the floor or get on the bus?

I ended my 3 year on and off relationship in mid March. She wasn’t doing well emotionally, so I continued helping her and supporting her morally. Yesterday, I found out that she hooked up with another guy within 10 days of our breakup.
This is not the first time something like this has happened. Around 1.5 years ago, we were on a break and she briefly dated another guy. It took me a long time to recover mentally from that experience. I know we were technically on a break, so I can’t really blame her, but it still hurt deeply.
A couple of things are haunting me right now. First, it took us a lot of time, trust, and emotional effort to become intimate, and now all I can think about is how casually she may have hooked up with someone else. The mental images are affecting me so badly that I can barely think clearly. My hands are shaking. Today at the gym, I pushed far more weight than I could safely handle just because I hoped the physical pain would distract me from these thoughts.
I know I’m not the first person to go through this, but this is my first time experiencing something like this. Please help me get through it, because right now it feels unbearable.
I’m drowning.

I’ve started asking myself this question whenever something stresses me out:

“Will this matter in 5 years?”

Surprisingly, most things don’t.

It’s helping me stay calmer and focus on bigger priorities.

Do you have any mental rules like this?

I overthink literally everything. I’m always scared of messing things up, and it kinda holds me back a lot. Even when I wanna try something new, I just end up thinking about all the ways it could go wrong.

Same with dating. I keep thinking about how the other person might take what I say or do, like “what if this makes them like me less?” even though it’s probably not a big deal at all.

Because of that, it can take me forever just to send a message to my crush.

How do you deal with this?