What would you tell your 18 year old self?

Doesn't matter, wouldn't have listened.
- Real

Three things.
Brush your damn teeth.
Spend time with your elderly family members while you still can.
Compound interest.
- Last year, when my daughter moved to college, I wrote her a letter containing my best advice.
  Brush your damn teeth was at the top.
  And I extend this advice to ANYONE ELSE who needs it.
  A fucked tooth is one of the most painful things I've ever experienced, and the way you fix it, is to pull it. And it NEVER comes back. Repeat this a few times and you're embarrassed to smile in front of anyone. It really messes with your self worth, and there's no coming back.
  Please, brush your damn teeth, and don't start smoking.
  Please everyone,
  
  My kids think I'm annoying for nagging them about their teeth, but I'm on a mouth fixing journey due to medical tooth loss and it is slow, painful, expensive, and embarrassing. People think I either do drugs or never learned to brush my teeth and I'd hate to see my kids go through that. It's a secondary reason to my continued masking in public and masking is absolutely the only reason I was able to find the job I have. Not that I am unqualified, but if I had smiled in an interview I never would have been called back.

Do NOT enlist in the military. They will use you, leave you mentally and emotionally fucked, and leave you by the side of the road when they're done.

You aren't lazy, you aren't undisciplined, you just have ADHD. get that shit diagnosed and treated or you'll lose your full ride scholarship.
A desk job is fine, and you're good at programming. Don't be afraid to major in something computer related.
BTC is a scam but buy a lot of it as early as possible, it'll peak around 65k. God doesn't exist, the republicans are fucking ghouls
- GET OUT OF MY HEAD
  
  ❤

If a girl invites you back for coffee, don't decline because you don't like coffee. She is probably the one who would send you your first Valentine's card a few months.
Delay your mother for just a minute on this specific day in 1997, you will save her life.
Go and see Sasha on this day in 2019. She's going to die and there's nothing anyone can do about it.

Most of your problems are due to undiagnosed ADHD.

In November 2020, you will invest all your money into Gamestop. Sell once the price hits $200.

Don't date her.
Don't ever start drinking.
Turns out you're gay and you don't know it yet.

If someone is willing to cheat with you, they'll cheat on you too
Stay away from cocaine
compound interest
Delayed gratification is usually worth it

DONT START SMOKING.
- This is the way!

Dump your highschool sweetheart, she's a cheating bitch when she goes off to college. Instead, date the girl you liked for 3 years but she didn't come around until you started dating the one who broke your heart. Though she was late to the game, and broke your heart 3 years straight... when she came to you with that 12 page letter, she was legit. She found and married the guy who was just like you and they lived happily... until covid killed her early on in the covid saga. But if she'd married me, she wouldn't have been in Georgia. She'd still probably have been a nurse, but not there. She might still be alive. Oh, and that rebound gal you dated, knocked up and married after the first gal, the cheater, broke your heart? She widows you. And shit just gets worse from there.
- Yikes

Buy bitcoin.

You don't have super powers, you're not having a "spiritual crisis," you have ADHD and you're losing your shit. See a doctor. Medicine is good.
That's it. That would basically rewrite the last 18 years of my life (not that it's been bad, but I lost out on doing cool stuff in my 20s to figuring out I had, and how to deal with, my mental illness)

Do not ever start that PhD, and keep on passing on shit you are not interested in. Especially when others say they are too good of an opportunity to pass. Otherwise keep going, little dude!
- Currently doing a phd and wishing I could go back in time and tell myself not to fucking do it. They really get you with that opportunity bullshit but the whole thing is a fucking pyramid scheme imo.
  
  It feels like it is, nicely coupled with the worst dependency on a superior I have ever experienced in my life. And this whole working for the collective knowledge of the community is bs to, including double-blind processes in paper reviews. You got to make sure the reviewers know who you are, and they make sure you know who they are ("how about you cite these 3 papers that are super relevant and just by coincidence come from the same author?"). Anyway, all the best to you!

I turn 18 in around a month... I guess I'd tell him to take care of himself and keep working on being less anxious, though I doubt he'd actually do it.
- Take care of your teeth and learn as much as you can. Your teeth don't heal and are never considered in health care, and there really isn't such thing as irrelevant knowledge.
  
  I have braces right now and it's very uncomfortable to have anything stuck in there, so I do take extra care of my oral health at the moment. Fortunately I'll have free dental care for the foreseeable future, given that I'm going into uni and then healthcare (this is how it works where I live).
  Agreed on lifelong learning, I want to (somewhat) be able to keep up with the world changing as I get older.

Two things: you have ADHD, learn how to deal with it now or things will get worse.
The other thing would be a hint on where to find my current SO.
Nothing I could change would affect her path in life up until I meet her. Our lives are very separate.

All the ADHDers in here. :(
Same. Same.

Pull out.

Don't sell your punk rock record collection

"No one will care about the GED. You did the right thing dropping out of that bullshit. You'll get into college next year."
Incidentally, nothing on that GED was anything I hadn't learned by middle school. I got an 'honors' GED because it was so fucking easy. I'm not trying to brag. I don't think I'm some kind of genius. It was just really easy. And then I spent the next decade, even though I did get into college, thinking people would think I was a fraud because I took the easy way out.
It all changed when I got invited to my 10 year high school reunion and realized even they didn't care.
- I would still be a housekeeper if I hadn't taken the GED. It was easy because it takes real ife experience in to account.

You'll survive those few days of 25C. Believe me, you'll wish for them soon enough when stuck with 40C days in spring.
You'll have fun
You'll marry (eventually)
Believe the doctor on the underwear part
You won't have kids, it worked
in 100 years, nothing will matter, go have fun and talk to girls. ;)
- The underwear part?
  
  When you get a vasectomy, tight fitting underwear helps in the hours/days after (relieving the strain on the wound).

Strive for independence with every fiber of your being. Your family that you live with doesn't love you.
That's why they're dicks to you. They lie and tell you it's "for your own good" or some other bullshit. But really they're afraid to admit that they don't know how to love you... They may not know how to love anyone.
Being grounded for 2/3 of the year every year - when you have no disciplinary or legal troubles - is imprisonment, it is not just punishment. Making you eat vomit is not an important life lesson, it is abuse. A person who openly favors one child over the other doesn't love any of her children, least of all you.
Your brothers learned to love from someone incapable of loving. That's why they are indifferent to your suffering. That's why they only care what you can do for them and feel no obligation to do anything that benefits you.
You can't snap your fingers and be independent. But it is within your grasp if you reach for it. Reach for it with your entire being.
Your dad is reaching out now because you're 18 and he doesn't have to deal with a psycho to get ahold of you anymore. Hold him accountable, but trust his intentions. He's rusty at relating, but let him show you how much he loves you. And use that to remind you of how much the others don't.

Your resiliency matters more than your fear of making a mistake, and you’ll never cover any ground if you can’t take a step.
- There’s a book called “chasing failure” by Ryan Leek that covers this really well. When you reframe what failure and success look like to you it opens up a lot of opportunities you’d never know were there!
  
  I’ll have to look that one up, thank you!

Smarten the fuck up, fucking graduate and then get your ass out of that Podunk town and get a real fucking job ASAP. You're worth more than they let you think you are.

Don't. Marry. Her.
- Fuck me.
  (and the Sunday sun shines down on San Fransisco bay, and you realise you can't make it anyway)
- I knew scrolling down I'd find this so I can vote it.

Bitcoin, gme stock. Start buying now and don't stop until rich.

- I know this is much easier to say than it is to internalize and believe, but it doesn't matter what any singular person thinks about you. There are people out there who do their best to understand and accept you as you are, without using what they learned to make half-assed guesses about the rest of who you are. They may be few and far between (or maybe not), but I know they exist. As soon as you start looking for those who accept you instead of trying to be accepted by those who don't, you'll be on a better course. And don't be afraid of anti-depressants. Depression makes yiu want to give up on fighting, makes you think nothing can help. It's a lie by which the illness sustains itself. By listening to that lie, you may protect yourself from harm, but you'll also "protect" yourself from finding happiness.
  And remember, parents, old friends, etc. who don't necessarily get you too well aren't necessarily trying to be cruel, but you may never have quite the relationship with them you wish you could. They have their own problems from their own anxieties and abuse growing up, their own mental health issues, etc., and that can limit the depth of relationships they can achieve with you. Try to be patient, but don't drive yourself insane trying to achieve what isn't possible.
  And if you feel like you don't belong, maybe you don't, and maybe that's okay. Maybe you're neurodivergent or simply have morals or interests that are incompatible with theirs. But the fact remains, there is someone who will accept you and with whom you can belong in peace, if you can open yourself up to let them. You haven't lost until the last time you give up on finding them. Giving up on something you still deeply care about, without eventually picking it back up again, is the only failure. It's okay to quit, but don't be afraid to come back to it if you care about it.
  ~ advice I try to accept myself, would give my younger self, and may hopefully be at least a little helpful for you
- I wish I knew this before I wasted so much effort trying to build relationships with assholes.

Your shyness is a choice, just start saying yes to things that scare you and it will get easier.
The moment I worked that out life got a lot better for me. I figured it out not too far past 18 but I wonder what relationship I would have with my hometown if I figured it out sooner.

1.) Drop out of high school and get your GED before your principal tells you to.
2.) Tell the high-school GF to hit the road. She's no good, and on some level, you know it.
3.) When the army recruiter comes around, tell him no. Do not be polite. Do not offer a reason.
4.) That half a semester of drafting you did in the 9th grade? Keep going down that road, don't wait until your 30s.

invest in bitcoins
- I had bitcoins when it was worthless and lost the wallet they were on. Would have been a decent amount had I taken it seriously. So yeah, I agree with you!
- Oh man, I could have bought so many Bitcoins back when it started and they were worth like $0.0009. Ah well.
  
  Back then there was a website that would gift you some.
  I bought about $50 at the time, but didn’t hold on to it because why. At some point I checked and still had a little bit of a balance, used it to build a nice computer in 2013.
  Could’ve paid cash for a very nice house if I hadn’t touched it at all, but most people weren’t thinking that way and it was originally meant to be used.

Get on ADHD meds. The diagnosis is right there, use it. Life’s better on meds and things make a lot more sense.

tell someone you're depressed.

Don't take life too seriously.

Start a retirement plan now!
Also, watch out for that bottle of Jarritos...

I know you're desperate. Do not get credit cards. You can hang on a few more years to be able to have nice things. The argument that you need to start building credit is rationalization. Your friends will love you even if you can't buy nice gifts. You're not smarter than every other delusional person who insists they can magically pay back more than they earn. Don't be stupid.

"You're not lazy or stupid, you have a rare, extreme case of MTHFR. Get on a high dose of methylfolate, and as soon as Cymbalta becomes available, get on that too.
Also, when you meet [name redacted], run. He's going to use you and spit you out "

Don't go to university directly after school. Get an apprenticeship as a software developer or better yet, as a webdeveloper in a company that creates websites for customers.
Get a car! Be independent! This is the freedom you so desperately need. With a finished apprenticeship and a possibility to leave your old life behind... The rest will fall into place. Everywhere is better than staying in the pity puddle that is your hometown.

Don't go live with your dad.
Don't get on the motorcycle he buys you.
Find this specific woman your age in the USA, she's your soulmate.
This is a tablet computer. Saved on it is a thing called Wikipedia. You're gonna make a fuckton of money. Use it to plant trees ASAP because we're fucked otherwise.
- Wikipedia has dates of important events from 1990s onward.
  Soulmate is my wife. She's asleep next to me :) We've talked about how to convince each other that we are time travelers before lol!

Nov 8, 2022: 10, 33, 41, 47, 56, 10

This should be obvious, but don't listen to your dad's relationship advice.

Start lifting weights and eating more

Not a god damn thing, not that he'd listen.

Tertiary education is a scam and you should have listened to the people who tried to tell you this.

Drop out of college to enter the workforce as you were not properly prepared for college and you still don't know what career you want. Don't join the military. Save up for a car.

It doesn't get better.

Boo! Then I'd run away

Be gay, trim weed.

Go to the doctor and ask for medication. It’s not normal to cry for a month in deep depression and then not sleep for a month due to manic excitement. Keeping it a secret and sitting the dark wanting to cut yourself while your friends and family are unaware is stupid and selfish.