Alone In My Childhood Bedroom

You ever hit that point where you don’t want productivity, progress, or another plan you just want sleep? We’re in that place tonight, and we say the quiet parts out loud: the exhaustion after an emotional week, the loneliness that shows up when family leaves, and the weird way your brain starts rummaging through childhood memories like it’s searching for proof you used to feel safe. 

We walk through what it’s like to end up back where you started, right down to remembering a loft bed, makeshift forts, an old TV under the frame, and the small comforts that made growing up feel manageable. From there, the conversation turns toward mental health, social anxiety disorder, and why posting on social media (and TikTok live streaming in particular) can be both a lifeline and a trap. Helping people is real, but so is the sting of feeling like you’re still mostly talking to yourself. 

Then grief enters the room. We talk about the kind of loss that changes a house forever, the images that don’t leave you, and the complicated peace that comes with having no regrets about showing up for your family. Along the way we land on something simple and surprisingly hard: letting your mind wander without a screen, remembering tiny details like a popcorn ceiling, and choosing authenticity over performance. 

If you’ve been wrestling with loneliness, burnout, grief, or the pressure to look “fine” online, this one’s for you. Subscribe, share it with someone who needs a quiet hand on their shoulder, and leave a review then tell us: what memory do you return to when life gets heavy?

Transcript

Wanting Sleep After A Hard Week

SPEAKER_00 0:00

Here's the deal. I want to go to bed. I don't want to wait until 11 p.m. for Mike and Liam to show up to record. And then an extra hour or two after that while I edit and upload everything. I just want to go to bed. It has been a long and emotional week. My sisters and my nephews just left yesterday. I am feeling drained, tired, depressed, lonely.

Childhood Trailers And Bedroom Flashbacks

SPEAKER_00 0:25

I spent the majority of today inside of my own head, at some points thinking about things like trying to figure out the details of all the trailers we had growing up. In particular, there's there's one that was around age five that I can't, it's there, but I can't quite I need a I need a picture of it to put it back into place. The other side of that being thinking about the present. And this year has been a year of change and none of it good. And that I am still alone and broke, and now I'm right back into my childhood bedroom again. My my bed used to be right there. It was a loft bed, so pictured about the height of the guitar, I guess. I don't know what made my parents get me a loft bed. I don't know if I don't remember if I had any influence in that, but man, was that the right decision? I'm telling you, get your get your kids a loft bed. It's great. Would grow up and as I grew up, would uh start making like forts underneath it. Whereas we got the the Nintendo and stuff. Eventually, as you know, the family got a new TV. I ended up getting the old TV and I put it under the bed with the Nintendo and I had my little fort down there and play my games. But of course, that was in addition to going out and doing sports and scouting and camping. As I mentioned, we we went through so many trailers. At least, at least there was a tent trailer, another trailer, there was a uh bunk bed, and then a three bunk bed. Anyway, that's for me to remember. I just had to throw that all together because playing games. I don't want I don't want to promote playing games as like I want playing video games, it's great, but it should be done alongside the other things, right? Oh look at this face. This is the face of a cat that wants to go to bed, right? Been a long hot

Social Media As A Lifeline

SPEAKER_00 2:33

day. When you end up back where you started, you can't help but wonder what you've been doing. You know, I got started on social media as a as a way to break out of my shell. I'd been, well, because of the social anxiety disorder, I was spending the majority of my time alone. And that was starting to have a pretty prolific effect on my mental health. And so, for whatever reason, I decided to try posting to TikTok that one day. And the journey has been interesting, and I have no doubt that I've helped people. In fact, I think that's what gives me the biggest struggle is that I I have heard from people that I've helped them and stuff, but then but then when I look at my mental health and the whole reason I started this, and when I when I go to live stream, it's mostly talking to myself. And I have to say, it again, that's that's the hard part for me is knowing there's that whole side of I've helped people, but it also for me feels like I'm still in the same spot. I'm still just talking to myself most of the time. And I'm jealous of a lot of the other streamers because when they turn off the stream, they still have the life behind the stream. A lot of them have significant others, families, whatever. When I turn off the stream, there's this a big empty

The Empty House And Grief

SPEAKER_00 4:17

house. A big empty house that I had to carry my dead dad's body out of. I know I I I've keep mentioned that a couple times. Uh it's you know, it's haunting. It's haunting. There's a reason why most people uh, you know, you have the what pallbearers and stuff, so you're not doing it yourself. And then there's me. I mean, I've said I'm smart, but I never claimed not to be stupid. No, I had to I had to do it myself. And then when it came time to bury them, I was the one that put the the ashes in the ground. And I'm glad I did. Don't get me wrong. But it's also an image that is going to be forever in my head. But I can say I have no regrets. I learned a couple things after my dad died. One of the neighbors popped in to say her condolences, and she said that um whenever she offered to take my dad to the hospital, my dad would always reply with uh, no, it's okay, Rob's coming. Or Rob's already here. Another um at the funeral, they were trying to figure out who somebody was, and they came over to me to ask, and they said that um apparently my dad told them that I know everything. Sometimes you sit there and you think, what if I'd done this or could I have done more or all those things? And of course I do. But even though, you know, everything else has been schitastic, let's go with schitastic. Um, I can at least say that I have no regrets in regards to being there for people, for my mom, for my dad, for my sisters, who, you know, they're still with us. Whenever they need something, they know they can ask me for it. And I know a lot of people aren't lucky to have a family like that. I have no idea where I'm going with this, by the way. I'm just talking. I just started this is how my mind's been going all day. Just going back and forth between things.

Letting The Mind Wander

SPEAKER_00 6:21

And sometimes you need that. Sometimes you need to just take a day to yourself and let your mind wander, get it all out. It's one of the things we don't really uh do enough of these days because we have technology and phones and stuff. We don't just lay there and think and try and picture your childhood. Little details that you've probably forgot about. I think my favorite today was just laying on my dad's bed. And I was looking up at the stupid popcorn ceiling, and I remembered laying as a kid in my parents' bed. They had a water bed at the time. Or, you know, at the time that I'm referencing anyway. Um laying there and look up at the popcorn ceiling, and you like you soften your gaze, and it's just because of the Now we now, you know, as I'm an adult, you know, it's because the muscles relaxing and stuff, and you the um the popcorn kind of like feels like it starts to move. And I remember being a kid and just being spaced out doing that once in a while. Because it was entertaining. Who at the time I didn't know why it did that. All I knew was just laying there and looking up at the ceiling. Magic happened.

Being Real Online And Off

SPEAKER_00 7:38

Sudden random topic shift, because that's again, that's the way my brain's going today. But you know, with the amount of um like fakeness going on on social media, can I first of all say that I am glad to I don't know if you guys can hear the thunder. I'm glad to have found podcast co-hosts, friends that are real, they're just as stupid off-screen as they are on screen. And if it wasn't for the fact that I just want to go to bed, I wouldn't mind the fact, you know, waiting up to hang out with them. But also, I really, I really hope that that's how social media will remember me as being real and honest. And this is the guy that when faced with taking care of his dad versus working on his um social media and everything, chose family, that got down on his knees and lowered his dad's ashes into the ground himself, that went and spent all Monday with his nephews at an amusement park, watching them go on rides because they're too young to go on any of the fun ones, and occasionally getting crammed into rides they needed an adult for that were not designed for people that were six

Closing Thoughts And Better Rest

SPEAKER_00 9:02

feet tall. So today's podcast has been random and occasionally thunderous if you guys actually hear that. Now that I think about it, the dead zone on the mic is towards the window, so you guys might not actually hear the thunder. But I don't know where I'm gonna go from here. But that's future Rob's problem. Today's Rob just wants to have a good sleep. Don't be your worst.