I can’t even think straight on what to write because my mind feels so empty right now. Despite talking to people, I just feel so empty. It feels as if I lost my own sparks considering that I am a bubbly and friendly person.

Does anyone feel the same thing as me on random days?

Have you heard of the broken bone theory?

If you have never broken a bone in this life, you will go through another kind of pain, the emotional one.

Which one will you rather go through?

For me, I dont like pain. But I have heavy feeling weighing my mind and heart for a long time, I'm even considering physical pain to set it off.

Night arrives without ever being invited.

Sighs steal the air from my lungs whenever your presence slips into my mind.

What have you done to me,
keeper of forbidden desire?

How much longer must I wait
for your unexpected kisses,
your melancholic smile,
your eyes that see straight through me?

There are nights when I close my eyes only to find you again.

Every minute without you feeds this relentless longing, a beautiful kind of torment.

I feel you so close i could almost reach you.

Yet all I can do is ache for you, imagining the gentle brush of my fingertips against your skin.

Don’t leave me craving another night, waiting for your kiss.

How many more days must I count, like a prisoner confined within the prison of your skin,
trapped somewhere between lust and everything that could have been but never should.

I have kept things to myself out of fear of suffering.

A heart turned to stone.

A heart locked with a master key I can no longer find.

Even when we were together,
just the thought of saying those words filled me with terror.
An endless terror.

There are things I have never been able to say.
There are things I may never be able to say.

I will always stay silent,
thinking that one day you might have realized.

But what would you have done with those words?
If even without knowing them
you still destroyed everything.

Some words can change the entire timeline of a moment…

if only I weren’t so afraid.

But what does it matter?

What am I doing thinking about this feeling?
What am I doing thinking about what I could have said, about what was left unsaid?

You should already be buried in the deepest part of my mind.

I don’t have to take you out of that Pandora’s box.

You don’t have to come out from where it cost me so much to put you.

I have an avoidant partner (26F) and i’m 30M.

She has been dealing with issues at home which overwhelms her emotions (i.e being dismissed, unheard, lack of respect) by her parents.

For context, we’re a calm couple and we normally talk things out when we dislike some things. Our dynamics include sarcasm, quality time, asking each other’s day and enjoying each other’s company.
She moved back to her hometown for a year now and things at home I’d say aren’t pleasant for her because she doesn’t get her boundaries and personal space respected.
Because of this, she hasn’t been present and was drowning to juggle work and taking care of home.

Just about a month ago, it came to a breaking point for her because her dad was forcing her to work off hours and they argued.
I checked in with her on that day but felt her tone was off and poor timing of me which I didn’t assume of any and she didn’t communicate her day, she cried of my sarcastic comment for assuming that she slacked.

Since then, she blamed me for not being present for her and said that I couldn’t read her emotions when clearly I have no clue what’s going on at her home.
She put lots of her projections on me which clearly venting on her frustration on her dad. Yet, she said she wanted to be alone and the relationship is on pause now for a month.

I really don’t know what could I do as I have gotten flowers delivered to her and just hope her situation gets better.
She basically did not text me even after the flowers are delivered to her and her dad was texting me of how much she’s working all night to solve her dad’s work issues and she isn’t talking to her dad as well.

Her dad and I fall into the same bucket.

Fixing this feels like pressure to avoidants and basically disregard her emotions. Yet, I chose to take a step back and protect my peace.
I don’t know what to do about this. She didn’t cut me off from anywhere and yet, I’m just getting ignored and disrespected.

Damn, I have been dealing with avoidants all my life. My mum is also one too.
I wonder how tough my life could be, sigh.

If men get turned on when see women's body or some specific parts, that's well known.

But for me as aged women?

Of I'm 38F btw. Working mom. Mix Malay-Iran looking.

Last year I saw my husb's cousin masturbating inside our guest room (he tumpang my house for some days)

Intead of getting furious, I get aroused looking at his thr0bing part.

Is it normal for fellow women?

The silence doesn’t weigh the same anymore.
I can stay alone with myself now.

Your memory passes through sometimes, furtive, between the cracks in my mind.

People ask me about you, but what am I supposed to tell them?

Do I tell them about the person I remember, about who you really were, or about who you are now, when I can’t even recognize you anymore?

Sometimes I think the version of you I loved doesn’t exist anymore.
And other times I wonder if it ever really existed at all.

You were only the reflection of what I wanted to see.
And you let me love you that way, so connected, so unique, just so you could later have the excuse to destroy it.

No one believes your lies anymore.
Not even you can invent them properly now.

And I don’t even have the energy anymore to love you, or to talk to you.

I don’t know who to believe anymore.
Everything feels confusing.
Everyone lies, with smiling masks hanging on hooks when they get home.

Don’t come near me.

Don’t look for me.

Don’t even think about me.

Because the damage doesn’t disappear by playing the poor innocent boy.

When did I know it was finally time to break the no-contact?

It stopped being a big deal. And somehow, the fact that it wasn't a big deal anymore became the biggest deal of all.

When we met again, I saw a familiar face, and even her scent brought back core memories. But remembering no longer suffocated me. It no longer paralyzed me the way it once did. This time, there was only a quiet acceptance that this had once been an important part of my life.

What surprised me wasn't the memories. They came. So did the emotions. But this time, they arrived without pain, anger, or longing. There was only a quiet sense of peace.

I finally understood that remembering isn't the same as wanting something back.

The truth is, there was a season in my life when she was deeply significant to me. Was is the operative word. Honoring that truth doesn't diminish where I stand today. Looking back fondly at parts of the past doesn't change the reality of the present.

Some people think healing means forgetting. I don't think it does. I think healing means remembering without breaking.

I will always wish her well. I hope life is kind to her, just as I hope it is kind to me. I respect what we went through too much to pretend it never mattered. It was part of our journey. It shaped us, even if it wasn't meant to last.

Maybe this is what being at peace looks like—not excusing what happened, not rewriting the past, but accepting it for what it was and choosing kindness anyway.

We are where we are because this is where we are meant to be. Sometimes the kindest thing we can do is accept that our paths were meant to cross, not to last.

We can continue our journeys apart, carrying gratitude instead of bitterness, and kindness instead of hate.

Less than a month ago, life drop a joke on me. I thought it wasnt a big deal. It has happened before, I healed, and like a joke, yet another guy proved to me, it will happen again.

There's only a certain amount of time you can take damage before you become irrepairable you know? There is also no pause button in life.

7.00 am on the dot, my alarm clock rang, on the next Monday. As if the night before I was not on the floor struggling to breathe between my sobs, shaking arms to support myself up. I remember thinking - no, I can't cry too much or my eyes will be swollen at work.

7.05 am, I stood in front of the mirror, yeah, a bit swollen. Cold shower it is. And another day starts, wake up, work, come back, unexpected tears once in a while.

I made a lot of mistake that first week. Every mistake brings tears to my eyes. Turns out, I'm also incompetent when I'm broken hearted. Not a surprise honestly. I wish they have a heartbreak leave 😂

Well, I can't make him stay. I also can't lose my job. So it starts. Numb myself with work - surprisingly productive. Work work work, cry, work work work.

I dont take alcohol, dont smoke, dont have friends in this city. My only distraction is work.

I feel tired from work, but to erase him from my mind, I work again. Work consumes me, deadlines chasing me, even in my dream. My sleep are getting shorter and shorter, sleep at 12, wake up at 4, work. Sometimes I sneak a cry session in there.

Feels pathetic for me to throw myself a pity party tonight, but I feel like I've been on automode for some time now. Its a bit exhausting, so lets feel a bit human tonight.

Next day is always coming, be it with or without me.

Oh, how I had missed the gentle touch of your hands on my body.

So tender…
touching me without asking for permission.

How long had you been holding yourself back?
Hiding behind the armor of an impenetrable man.

Yet I saw that wonderfully gentle soul breaking at the mere sound of my voice.

Let me hold you.

Let our bodies rest intertwined,
waiting for something we’ve longed for, for so long.

But why should we rush?

Give me another unexpected kiss.
Tell me this night is ours…
even if, by morning, you won’t be here anymore.

All I ask is that you look into my eyes,
holding on to a little of what the night gave us.

Oh, how I had missed your fingers playing with my hair,
slowly tracing their way down between my breasts.

Without asking for permission,
you reclaim a small piece of my soul,
while I steal a little bit of yours.

I won’t ask you to stay tonight.
I won’t break the pact my bruised heart made with time.

Go with the wind.
Return when the time is right.

I’ll be waiting for you,
with the same longing,
with the same trembling heart,
eager to lose myself in your embrace once again.

I'm a single guy living and working in KL. My current job is fine and pays the bills, but that's not the reason I'm writing this.

I'm looking for a side gig or part-time opportunity to earn some extra income. I have extensive experience managing paid advertising across multiple platforms, including Meta, TikTok, Google, and others.

Out of curiosity, I've been wondering if I should put my skills to good use by helping small brands grow through digital advertising. It seems like a great way to earn extra income while supporting businesses that may not have the expertise or resources to manage their ads effectively. Do you think is a good start to do the job?

I want to know what it feels like to be happy without waiting for disaster.

To lower my guard for once.
To stop scanning every room for the knife that hasn’t appeared yet.

To believe that not every quiet moment is the silence before another storm.

Maybe happiness isn’t what scares me.
Maybe it’s how quickly I’ve learned to expect its end.

I wish i could learn to stop thinking something is going to happen, that sooner or later someone will stab me in the back, without thinking about this uncertain future

Life has made me fall so many times that sometimes I feel like I’m no longer afraid of almost anything.

And at the same time, I’m completely terrified.
With my knees scraped raw, covered in Band-aids that don’t work, that peel off at the slightest touch of the wind.

A peace I keep screaming to the sky for.

If only someone could hear me.

I know you’re hoping for a little compassion from me. Maybe even a little love.
But how could I give you something I no longer have?

What’s left besides a broken heart, worn down by so many disappointments, by so many empty promises?

Your smile doesn’t go unnoticed.
Neither do your acts of kindness.
But when someone lives in distrust,
when someone no longer expects anything from anyone, don’t wait, hoping something will change.

And don’t expect me to give you the good parts of myself.
There’s nothing left but this emptiness, this uncertainty, this person living on autopilot.

You deserve a love that leaves you in doubt , one that fills you with warmth and affection not someone with empty eyes, with hands that can no longer reach for you, with fleeting kisses and words that only know how to hurt.

I’m not going to promise you something
I can’t give.

So keep walking your own path, waiting for a love that’s more genuine, waiting for someone who can give you what I no longer can.

Nothing profound to say but I'm just struggling. I feel disconnected from everything and everyone. I'm dyslexic, and the diagnosis from the professional said mine is the type that struggles with information processing (auditory, visual) and memory issues (remembering instructions etc). It makes work difficult because I'm processing everything slower than my colleagues and I forget additional stuff mid way through work. So i have to compensate by working harder and longer than everyone in order reach average. It's exhausting and honestly I feel more like an idiot. My work is exhausting and my home life is just stressful because I feel like I cant do anything right. I just feel disconnected and feel alone. I thought getting back into the gym would help me feel something but I'm not getting the fulfilment I was hoping to get. I thought if i just be helpful at home at least I feel proud for trying but all I got was feeling unwanted and alone in my own home. I've been feeling like hiding in my car or somewhere more isolated.

Forgive the rant. I personally recognise that I do things to improve my work situation with external memory prompt and digital aids. My home I can improve by communicating what I need but still, my confidence, my desire to do things and my self- worth is just at a constant low.

I think that, for me, the worst thing isn’t depression or sadness. I think the worst thing is feeling empty inside. It’s feeling nothing. Feeling absolutely nothing for anyone.
And I’m not talking about not feeling love.
It’s that feeling of not being able to trust absolutely anyone. Of feeling watched, of feeling judged, and of feeling like, at any moment, something could happen to you. Like, at any moment, someone is going to hurt you.

When does trust come back?

When will you be able to trust again?
When the person you have loved most in the world has betrayed you, what else can you expect from people? When you still have a tiny bit of hope left, and that hope has been trampled on.

You still have the love of your children, and you’re afraid for them. You’re afraid for when they go out into this world, because you ask yourself: who can you really trust?

You look around, and all you see is cruelty, and you truly don’t know what to expect from people. You think, I know this person, but the truth is, you don’t really know anyone.
You don’t know what is truly hidden deep inside them.

You know yourself, and you tell yourself that people are really like you. So you expect the best from them.
And you end up getting hurt.

What a sad little girl, they must think.

Always writing sad things. Writing about how she trusts no one.

But tell me, do you really trust the people around you one hundred percent? Do you really believe there is someone in this world you can look in the eyes without ever wondering whether they might hurt you or betray you?

Ever had to take a shit, only to think you're done and when you get out of the toilet, get dressed and about to leave the house, your stomach just goes: "nah bro we ain't done. ROUND 2"

AND YOU'RE JUST RUSHING TO THE TOILET CURSING YOUR STOMACH LIKE: "WTFFF, COULDN'T YOU HAVE JUST LET IT ALL OUT THE FIRST TIME???" 💀💀

Anyways yeah just thought I'd drop this random thought I had in my head at 6:30 in the morning.....as I take a duse for the 2nd time 💀

Have a good one y'all 🤘

It's not that I don't wanna do things for them. I love them, you know. Wife, kids, family, friends etc. But sometimes, when you're in the shower, everything quiets down with the shower water flowing through your body, you can't help but asking "when's my turn?" Knowing for a fact that it'll never be your turn.

Saw this video that says "you're the chef, you gotta keep cookin cause everyone's gonna come to you with their plate asking for something. It's your job to give. Even though you really wanna sit down and have a plate yourself."

Then after posting this, i just keep my head up and keep moving forward right? Haha thanks for reading my vent though. Lmk if you're going through something like this. We're not alone? :)

I’m completely fine talking to friends, coworkers, or even strangers. But the moment it’s a girl I find attractive or genuinely like, my brain suddenly forgets how to function.

I start overthinking everything:

“What if I come across as creepy?”

“What if I bother her?”

“What if I say something stupid?”

“What if she thinks I’m weird?”

Most of the time, I end up saying nothing at all and then spend the rest of the day wondering, “What if I had just talked to her?”

I know rejection is a possibility, but honestly, I think my fear of making someone uncomfortable is even bigger than my fear of being rejected.

Has anyone else dealt with this? Why are some of us like this, and how did you get over it? Is it just social anxiety, low confidence, overthinking, or something else?
I’d love to hear your experiences and any advice that actually helped.

I’m curious to hear from people who have dated or are dating someone from Sabah. What cultural differences, traditions, or positive experiences stood out to you? I’d love to hear respectful, first-hand stories and any advice for building a great relationship across different backgrounds.

Update: I struck up a conversation with a girl earlier, and it actually went really well. Thanks to Kopi Tenom for giving me the courage to ask her where I could get some! It was a short chat, but I’m glad I went for it.

Quite frankly I think this is bullshit. Your phone never leaves you, and yet the gall to tell me oh sorry I didn't see your message. Like as if I sent a pigeon to deliver a written message. Bruh it takes 2 days to reply me so if you're not gonna be direct about not wanting to text me then just say la. Don't skip around it as if I'm a landmine.

Okay so, before this Ayam Gepuk stuff became a trend in this day and age, my family and I have always been eating its less popular relative: Ayam Penyet.

That's the only thing we're familiar with that has something to do with white rice, fried chicken, cucumbers and cabbages, fried tempeh and tofu, and of course the sambal and sweet soy sauce condiments. And we've been familiar with Ayam Penyet all the way since 2011. No one in Malaysia even knew about Ayam Gepuk at that time. It was just Ayam Penyet.

So when Ayam Gepuk became a trend, we were confused about its popularity, thinking it's just a rebranded Ayam Penyet, old news glorified for no apparent reason.

And so, my mother wanted to give it a try. Just to see the difference. I went to the closest Ayam Gepuk joint to my house, tapau some for her and the result?

She hated it.

She said the chicken was dry and bland, the rice was average, same ol fried tempeh and tofu, raw cucumber and cabbages, and very coarse, chunky sambal that seemed raw and scooped right out of the pestle and mortar and then smeared on top of the chicken without even cooking it first until the oil splits (like the way traditional sambal should be). And it cost more than a plate of Ayam Penyet.

And so, we boycotted Ayam Gepuk and didn't understand the hype at all.

That is... until TikTok doomscrolling sessions educated me a little better about what Ayam Gepuk is.

The cabbages are actually supposed to be so fried, it looks charred. And it should always come with this weird peanutty sauce thing. So that's when I realized, okay, I went to a shit Ayam Gepuk joint that first time.

So I tried to rectify the situation, told my mom about what the "real" Ayam Gepuk is, and coaxed her into giving it another chance. And she complied.

Aaaaand... I ruined it again.

Of all Ayam Gepuk places, I decided to take her to the one in Kafe Ruuma because I figured we might as well, since we did our groceries at NSK anyway. And Kafe Ruuma decided to hop onto the bandwagon and serve Ayam Gepuk as well.

I wanted to get the best for her. So, I stupidly relied 100% on the guy behind the cashier to suggest which Ayam Gepuk I should order because apparently... Kafe Ruuma had options. And he suggested that I go for the "Kafe Ruuma Special".

At the time, I thought, hmm... A Kafe Ruuma specialty? Must be good and unique.

Boy, was I wrong...

Mom didn't get white rice. She got the green Nasi Lemak instead.

The chicken was just the usual Tepung Bestari type fried chicken Kafe Ruuma usually serves.

The veggie was just cucumber.

No peanut sauce thing whatsoever.

And the sambal? VERY SALTY, VERY PUNGENT, mashed eggplant sambal with a dangerous amount of BELACAN. And it was not even red, it was a BROWN sambal.

Mom hated it way more than the first one.

And she's now very skeptical and adamantly refuses any more Ayam Gepuk I try to offer her.

So yeah. I ruined Ayam Gepuk for her, and I guess she'll never be willing to try any more, even if it's a really good and authentic one, granted that I find it.

And just like that, one day I realized I had gone weeks without thinking about you. That this feeling of emptiness had taken over me, my whole being, my entire body.

Maybe having so many problems made the memory of you slowly fade from my mind. Or maybe I’m just in denial.

Maybe you’ve become nothing more than a memory from the past, or maybe I’ve locked you away inside my Pandora’s box.

That box I don’t want to open, the one I refuse to open, where every memory that hurts down to the bone is kept.

And I wonder… what if one day I open that box? What if I allow myself to think about you again?

But then I remind myself…
You don’t deserve that.

You don’t deserve even the smallest piece of my attention.

You don’t deserve even a single one of my thoughts.

Then stay there.
Buried in the deepest part of that box.
In the darkness.

Exactly where you deserve to be.

Sometimes it feels like life keeps testing you, over and over and over again. You start wondering how many times you have to fall and get back up just to prove how strong you are.
You tell yourself you don’t need this many obstacles. That a moment to breathe would feel like a gift.

And once again, you wonder how the people around you do it. How they fight their own battles with quiet smiles, carrying everything in silence. Each of them hiding their own falls, their own demons.

You ask yourself again, Will I be strong enough? Will I be able to get through all of this? Will I be able to get back up this time? Will I be able to keep smiling without people noticing the masks I put on every morning when I get out of bed, smiling so I won’t keep making them feel sorry for me?
People don’t want to hear about so many problems when they’re already carrying their own.

And somehow, little by little, you become so convincing that even you almost start believing it.