Ask Member #58

Wow thats amazing!
I hope you'll upload some pictures some time just to show us what you can do, if that isn't too weird that is :p

I think that being able to really cook is quite impressive

I thought I had some photos of some things I cooked over the autumn saved, but it turns out I only have this one. Just a pasta, but the chicken was cooked with apples, and with a cream and apple juice sauce with it. Really autumn-y, but it was extremely nice! Loved cooking it too, not even sure why, it was just fun.

That looks really good You can never go wrong with pasta! Its pretty much everyones favourite

Okay.

Hello, everybody. Pinkerton here, Costello here, Nisha here, whichever of my thousands of usernames that you may or may not recognise, I am here. I have something that I would like to say to you all, and this thread seems like the place to do it.

I'll give you a warning beforehand. If you're reading this, if you're upset by mentions of suicide, then please don't read any further. Know that I love you, that I'm sorry, and that I don't want to upset you.

I was promoted into the role of Administrator with good intentions. The forum was dying, things were rough behind the scenes, people were leaving despite the staff team's best efforts - the three of us that remained, anyway - everything was going wrong. We were making changes, changes that we'd wanted to make for so long, things that we knew - just knew - would change the forum for the better, but it wasn't enough. PokéSun slowed down more and more, staff absences continued, the forum changed hands yet again.

My intentions were good. I wanted to help, and I wanted to fix what had gone so wrong in a community that I had grown to love.

Maybe I wasn't the best choice for the role, maybe I should never have been anything more than an ordinary member. We all know my story up until maybe around this time last year. I was a nuisance. I was a rule-breaker, I was banned multiple times for a number of reasons. I constantly criticised everything around me - members, staff, decisions, all of it. Within the space of almost a year, I came from what must have been my fifth forum ban or so to being one of the forum's administrators.

And I did want to change everything.

Moving on to another story, I've been here for a long time. Through all the personal crisis and problems that I disgustingly projected onto other members here, some of you might remember mention of my stomach problems, maybe a couple of years ago. The part nobody here knows is that the problems got much worse, and that must have been around April last year, I was eventually told that I had cancer that had spread to my lymph nodes.

If I'm not mistaken, this is around the time I went missing from this forum.

I want to make it clear that I didn't purposely abandon you all. I love this forum. I love all the people that I met, I love all the friends that I made, and I love all the friends that I drove away. I love you all.

As somebody with mental health difficulties anyway, my anxiety has always been a huge problem at the best of times, this was the one push that I didn't need. I have no problem talking about this time in my life, and given the suddenness of my leaving, I feel that I owe you the entire story.

The next few months or so were hell.

I genuinely believed I was dying. Apparently I had up to a year to live, so my immediate decision was to speed it up. I tried to kill myself twice with pills, and failed both times, falling asleep only to throw up. Once was at home, once was in Paris - I'd decided to finally go to France and from what I remember, I think I enjoyed it. After a brief spell in a hospital, I was back outside again, and ended up drifting back into the soul-devouring maw of my ex-girlfriend.

My depression and mental situation was not helped by that quickly developing into an extremely abusive relationship. I honestly don't know why I put up with that for as long as I did. I wasn't myself, I didn't have any motivation to even try to save myself. In the best moments of my life, around friends, laughing, I've always known that I wasn't happy inside. Even now I can't even picture how far down the dark path I was just half a year ago.

It took the hospital six f******* months to tell me that I didn't actually have cancer. I wasn't dying, and it took them that long to tell me.

And here I am now. I'm feeling better. I lived through the darkest year that I could imagine, and I'm here telling it to you all. Why?

I feel ashamed. I feel guilty. I feel like I let you all down, and if I managed to prove anything as an admin, as somebody once seen as the worst of the worst members of this community, someone that redeemed themselves enough to lead, I hope I proved that letting you down is the very last thing that I truly wanted to do.

I'm feeling better now. I've had help with my trauma, the wishes to hurt myself are gone, and I'm not dying. I still have my stomach condition, but I have medication for that now. I feel great, even. Better than I've felt for a long time.

So now I'm here, asking for forgiveness, not knowing whether I should stick around, whether I want to, or whether anybody wants me to. I apologise with all my heart to this community that I wanted most of all to protect and help. I started helping, I did do things that helped, but I guess it all came at the wrong time.

The forum looks nice. It's back in the right hands now, and away from mine, and that makes me happy.

This is my AMA thread still, I guess. Hello, everybody. I'm Pinkerton. Nothing's off-limits. Ask me whatever you like. Let's start a conversation, maybe. I'd like that a lot. And I'd still like to help.

@ninJAS
@Bloom
@Zueq

This is a very touching story, Pinkerton, and thank you for sharing it with us. I am struck speechless by the tremendous amount of courage that it must have taken to write such an extensive post regarding a matter that is not easy to cope with, much less articulate about, and I believe it speaks volumes about your character. I truly admire the depth of your resilience, and your determination to improve one's self despite all of the challenges you have endured. I do still remember your time as an Admin, and I respect you for your strong initiative to bolster the forum activity during one of PokeSun's drier seasons. It is perfectly fine that you decided to give yourself a break from the community, and I believe that you are far more appreciated by your fellow members here than you think. Your commitment to assisting and bettering the community has certainly not gone unnoticed.

I am not capable of saying anything more on this matter, other than the fact that you have been sincerely missed in the community. I may not know you personally, but, the prospect of companionship is always open to you. We welcome you back with open arms, and I hope that you steadily recover from the major upheavals you have experienced in the previous year.

Welcome back, and continue taking care of yourself!