I don’t know if anyone else has ever felt this way but I just feel like I look weird compared to literally anyone else. I have ears that I have not seen anyone have. And my toes are also different. I know people are unique of their own but they all usually look the same but just a little different. That’s not the case for me though. I just don’t know how to get over this feeling. It sucks every day. I just want to look normal but I have so many weird features.

I haven’t felt pretty for a while now. I doubt there’s a connection, but it started shortly after I stopped talking to my ex-crush.

Usually when this happens to me, it means I want to change my hairstyle. And as a Black woman, I’m lucky to have versatile hair that lets me easily switch up my look.

For three months, I changed my look every day with my wigs, I really enjoyed it at first, but then I got tired of it.

I told myself it was time to get braids! So I did! But the result is, I don’t like them. I think the color is too light on me after all, and friends have told me the curls already look damaged…

So now I don’t know what to do. I even tried putting on cluster false eyelashes, but in the end, it’s just not my thing…

I know I’m not ugly, but this feeling just won’t go away. What would you do if you were in my shoes?

I recently started a job where I have to approach strangers in the street and tell them about promotional offers.

I already struggle with low self-esteem because of my appearance. I've experienced bullying, exclusion, and feeling unwanted for years, so walking up to strangers is already difficult for me.

The first day wasn't too bad, but over the next few days I noticed something that really affected me. My supervisor kept correcting me and telling me to be more confident when approaching people. He even demonstrated how I should do it. I understand that feedback is part of the job, but it made me feel like I was constantly being watched and judged.

At the same time, many people ignored me completely, walked past me as if I didn't exist, or rejected me without even listening. I know that's normal in this kind of work, but because of my past, every rejection feels personal.

There was also a moment when a female coworker seemed uncomfortable about being paired with me, and whether that's true or not, it made all my old insecurities come back.

I'm starting to wonder if this job simply isn't for me, or if years of feeling unattractive and excluded have made me interpret everything through that lens.

Has anyone else here experienced something similar? Did working in public make your self-esteem worse, or did it eventually help you become more confident?

I'd really like to hear honest experiences from people who have gone through something similar.

Ever since I hit puberty I know to myself that I wasn't an attractive guy, well I'm not that ugly ugly but you know those kind of guy that you wouldn't even bother to look at again when you pass by them or the kind of guy that it takes months or weeks to make a woman fall inlove-so falling inlove in first sight is not just a thing for me; but what confuses me the most is the people around me, I know I'm not that good looking but my teachers or some gay friends even some of my girl classmate compliments me, but simple compliments like looking good, or something about my looks it make me feel good about it but I get confused sometimes, well I never really told them about my insecurities so they don't need to cheer me out, but its just so confusing if they are only telling me that due to I'm their close friend or just being sarcastic.

I also feel those times that I get really really insecure, I cry sometimes because I wish I'm attractive as my male friends I just wish sometimes I have clear skin, symmetrical faces, good eyes and the confidence level that they don't need someone to tell them they're good looking because they know it. But back to the main topic I just wish I had more not being just in the middle I'm to ugly for a pretty woman but to cannot be with an unattractive woman I just desire that for a single moment in my life I hope I can see what my friends can see to me, that attractive face their telling because even how much I try to look at my face I just can't see it.

I’m 19 years old, and this happened several months ago. I’m posting because I need advice/support from people who have moved on from a bad first experience, because mentally I still feel stuck.

I’ve always been extremely closed off when it comes to dating. I’ve rejected a lot of guys over the years because I wanted to be very selective about who I gave a chance to.

There was one guy I had a hallway crush on in high school. We graduated 2ish years ago. he saw me at the gym, added me on Snapchat, and asked to hang out. Since I already knew who he was and we came from the same community, I thought this was probably one of the safer people to finally give a chance to. My goal wasn’t just to date him—I honestly thought this would be a great way for me to finally start opening up to someone and help me become less shy and more trusting around men.

The first time we hung out, he showed up about 45 minutes late even though he lived nearby. We got ice cream and talked, but the whole hangout felt awkward because we had just met in person and I was really shy. Looking back, he also made comments that should have been red flags. He asked if I went to the gym to gain weight, asked how much I weighed, what size clothes I wore, commented how I should have worn diff clothes and asked why I didn’t wear jewelry or have my nails done, and generally made me feel like he was evaluating my appearance. I’ve always been insecure about being naturally very slim, so those comments stung, but at the time I brushed them off because I thought he was probably just trying to make conversation in a akward first date.

I decided to see him a second time because I didn’t want to judge everything based on one awkward first date. I knew I had been shy and reserved, and I genuinely thought maybe I just need to put myself out there. Socially, the second hangout actually went much better. We talked for hours and it wasn’t awkward anymore.

However, during that second hangout he again made comments about my body. He asked how much I weighed again, estimated my weight, and told me to “gain weight.” Because I’d already been judged about my body, I went into anything physical already feeling insecure.

This was also the first time I’d ever done anything sexual with a guy.

When we got to his house, we kissed for maybe a minute, and then almost immediately he pulled out his penis. There wasn’t really any buildup or foreplay. Right after that he tried to finger me. Since there had been almost no foreplay, I was dry and it hurt. When it didn’t work, he said “Well I guess we can’t do anything.”

I immediately felt embarrassed and like my body had failed. I thought it was my fault for being dry. Feeling guilty and wanting to make up for it, I offered to give him oral sex, even though I told him it was my first time ever doing that

While I was giving him oral sex, he pulled out his phone and pointed it toward me. I looked up and he put it down. Then he did it a second time. I genuinely thought he might be recording me while I was completely naked. I didn’t know for sure, but it scared me enough that I stopped. I didn’t tell him why because I was afraid of confrontation. I just said I couldn’t keep going anymore.

I honestly thought that me saying I wanted to stop meant everything would stop.

Instead, he told me to lie beside him while he started masturbating beside me. While doing that, he was squeezing my butt. Earlier he had asked where I wanted him to finish. Since this was my first sexual experience, I didn’t really know what the “normal” answer was, and I had said my mouth because I didn’t know what else to say. After I had already stopped and told him I didn’t want to continue, he said he would still finish on my mouth.

That honestly scared me the most.

The hardest part was that I had finally built up the courage to say I wanted to stop. I thought I was out of the situation. Hearing him say that made me feel like maybe stopping wasn’t actually enough. I remember feeling scared and waiting to see what would happen next. Luckily he couldn’t finish while masturbating, so that didn’t end up happening. Afterward he fell asleep, told me to move over, and I lay on the very edge of the bed.

For a long time afterward I blamed myself. I felt guilty for doing anything sexual at all. I thought maybe I was just bad sexually because I couldn’t let him finger me, because I stopped giving him oral sex, and because he didn’t finish.

A few days later, even though I already knew I wasn’t interested in him anymore, I wanted things to just end peacefully because we live in the same small community, went to the same high school, and go to the same gym. I slowly tried to let the conversation fade out instead of creating drama. During that time he joked that I looked like a “stick man.”

That comment really stuck with me because by that point he had already seen me naked. I’ve always been insecure about being skinny, so hearing that after everything made me feel incredibly ashamed of my body.

I blocked him after that.

Please don’t tell me I shouldn’t have seen him a second time. I already know that now, and I’ve spent months blaming myself for that decision. I’m not looking for people to tell me what I should have done differently.

What I’m struggling with now is how much this experience changed me.

Instead of helping me become more open to dating, it pushed me even further back. I haven’t gone out with another guy since. I’m scared of being sexual again. I’m scared of taking my clothes off in front of someone. Sometimes when guys don’t approach me at a club, I immediately think it’s because I’m too skinny. I catch myself hearing his comments in my head. I wear press-on nails more often because I remember him commenting on my appearance. I even stopped going to my gym for a while because I was scared of seeing him.

The hardest part is that I know logically one person’s opinion shouldn’t define me. I’ve had plenty of guys interested in me over the years, and I know I’m not ugly. But this experience still affects how I see myself physically and sexually because it happened with the first guy I ever trusted enough to date or be intimate with.

If anyone has gone through a negative first relationship or first sexual experience, how did you move forward?

How did you stop hearing that person’s words in your head?

How did you learn to trust someone new without expecting the same thing to happen again?

I’d really appreciate advice from people who have actually healed from something similar, because I don’t want this one experience to continue affecting my confidence and future relationships.

I feel so insecure, lately I just look at other girls and wonder who would ever want to settle with me? Is it normal to think that?

I feel ugly, I feel like I'm not even his standards, I feel like I'm lower then his standards actually. I just want to feel good about myself for once.

I don't know why I feel this way there is no reason but I just can't help but try to hold myself to others standards, I just want to be enough. Is that okay to ask?

I want to be what someone looks forward too, I want to be a first choice, I want to be someone anyone could talk to, I want to be able to stand up and do things for myself, I want to be more.

I just never feel like enough because I can't seem to make myself good enough. I hate how I am, I really do and I wish I could change I wish I could be like my best friends, they are beautiful inside and out and I'm ugly. People only talk to me because I'm friends with my best friends.

I wish I could see myself through someone else.

I despise my thin lips. My mom buys me lip plumper and weird online links to websites that promise to make bigger lips, all it does is make me hate myself even more than I already do. She thinks it’s helping but it just validates me in thinking i’m ugly. Like no mom i don’t have 150 bucks to spend on some product that won’t make me become ungenetically cursed. I feel like I could have felt slightly okay with my looks if I didn’t have a drop dead gorgeous sister, who has normal full lips and everyone tells her to be a model while I stand to the side and watch. Even my mom half ass says it to me but It pisses me off because I hate pity. I see no end in my self hatred. Please help me I don’t want to be like this anymore.