What was 2016 like for you?

This is a topic I’ve been rather interested in for the last couple months. I’d like to know, what was your experience in 2016? What did you do that year? Do you feel it was a good year or a bad one?

I’m asking because it seems people are now saying it was a good year, but I swear I remember people saying it was complete shit. There was something in the air that year, surely I’m not crazy for thinking that.

As for me, I actually wrote an entire blog post about it back in June, and it’s crazy to think it’s been ten whole years since it all happened. In short, I was still figuring myself out and I was extremely awkward. But I did have fun… to some extent. Even though there’s a lot I also very much regret.

I’d be curious to hear what you guys have to say about 2016, if you remember anything from that particular time period.

I was in undergrad, getting my associates degree, just out of high school from the year before overall, the atmosphere felt pretty pessimistic. People nowadays have nostalgia over that era. I wasnt as carefree back then, still kinda cared what people thought about me, but I had fun back then. To me, I dont get that rosy about it, since I was also focusing primarily on getting solid grades, that belongs to 2008-2013. By 2016, I had started going hard into learning the ins and outs of meteorology and was seriously pursuing it as an actual career path. I dropped that idea a year later. I was also becoming rapidly known as the family and friends tech support guy. If I had to rate it out of 10, id give that entire year personally a solid 6-7 (haha 67)/10  

2016 was a very complicated year full of lots of ups and downs for me. Two things stick out to be in particular though.

For one, that's the year I graduated high school! I struggled a lot in school, so we weren't entirely sure I was going to graduate at all. But for my final two years, I took online classes instead of in-person to alleviate some anxiety and get me away from bullies, and I managed to pass enough to graduate. I didn't go to a ceremony, but my mom still had her old cap and gown, and so we took pictures in the back yard to celebrate. My neighbors across the street, a little old couple Bruce and Mabel, noticed and sent me $20 in the mail to congratulate me :)

However, that year was also really hectic. That year was the Clinton VS Trump election, and because I had just turned 18 in time for it, I had to suddenly rush to learn how to vote. And it was a terrifying election as well, suddenly seeing someone so hateful and dangerous being widely praised by the public, suddenly realizing that my own vote, while important, would only make a dent. I stayed up late that night to watch the results and I just cried the entire time knowing that everything was going to be different. It completely shifted my view of democracy forever.

After the election, I stopped telling people I was trans. I only re-embraced it within the last two years.

Needless to say, 2016 and I have a very... strained relationship.

I was in middle school (8th grade) and a total fucking loser lmao. I got bullied pretty bad during those years, I was emo, I listened to Christian rock bands like Skillet because my dad thought they were cool, I had a stupid haircut, no sense of style, no social media besides Pinterest, undiagnosed issues like adhd and tbh probably autism but we don't know that for sure, one of my medications made me suicidal, got off that med and started a different one and started breaking out into hives on a monthy basis, I had a middle school boyfriend, Donald Trump got elected, Harambe died.

Bad year.

i was 8, turned 9 later in the year. going from the 3rd grade into the 4th grade. just the previous year i moved in with my grandparents as my parents divorced. it wasn't perfect but i have precious memories of then. my minecraft obsession continued and i watched a lot of videos on other games like modded gta (without even really knowing much about gta). i watched of the loud house (a new show i liked at the time...) and a lot of wrestling. and given i was a kid my autistic obsessions were a lot more pronounced, i would often talk about them in the open. i was obsessed with 90s nickelodeon, and to a degree 90s cartoon network, always wanting to watch them as they were and hoping one day i would be able to.

life seemed a lot more simpler, a lot more brighter. i still vaguely felt i should've been living a different life, but back then i realized there was more time to change that, that maybe the world would gradually get better, that my parent's divorce wouldn't stop me from living a full filling life.

I remember a few really significant things from that year.

In February of 2016, I entered my first relationship. It ended up lasting for 7 years and ended on good terms, and I learned a lot about myself during that time. So I'd chalk it up as a good memory.

April was when I migrated from Skype to Discord, which was a pretty significant change at the time. Weird to think it's been 10 years now, doesn't seem like that long ago.

I played a lot of Overwatch, it was brand new that year and my ex was really into it, so we played a lot together.

We had a uh... pretty infamous election here in the US in 2016. Not a good memory.

Then my older sister's wedding was in December of 2016, and that was a really good time. Kind of ended the year on a high note.

I might have also graduated college in 2016? Either that or it was 2017, I can't actually remember.

Side note (I read your blog post): I LOVED Miitomo! I never would have remembered that was in 2016, but I still think about it from time to time. I got all my friends into it and would check in daily to answer questions/read my friends answers. I miss it SO much. I have a few screenshots, but they were all photo gallery/dress up stuff. Wish I had some of my answers to look back on. I still have the app downloaded on my phone, though obviously nothing happens when you open it. I played (and still play once in a blue moon) Pokemon GO as well, I was actually camping at the time it came out, but I still caught a bunch of pokemon and had a good time with it.

I had several issues in 2016 that I wasn't dealing well with, started specific therapy to work through some past traumas, & played PokeGo about it. Probably way too much PokeGo. Started getting out a lot more & met some great people that year that are still my friends today. Went to a bunch of really great local shows.

I turned 11 in 2016. it was the same year I found my first online fandom that I loved participating in, I also found my first special interest that lasted for several years, and a hobby that I still do today. there were so many moments in just that year of taking the first steps to finding my true way of self expression, even if it was just being an illiterate child roleplaying their favorite character on the internet

2016 was also the last ever year I still fully had my childhood innocence, and I'm serious like ON THE DOT. exactly new years eve at the end of 2016, my dad caught my mom cheating on him (with my current-stepdad) in my own bed..... 😭 my mom took automatic custody since they were never married and we moved out within a month. everything changed for me, I never moved houses before, I had to leave my two dogs behind, it was an extremely difficult transition for me. I had a whole edgy phase because I couldn't process such a drastic change in such a short amount of time

so that is partly why I consider 2016 to be the best year of my life, it was the last one where everything was still "perfect" in my eyes and I was genuinely just a happy kid who didn't have to know anything bad about the world yet. it's absolutely crazy to me that the 10-year anniversary to that incident is coming in just a few months

I graduated that year and thought it was a really bad year, not just for me, but just for society in general. Riots had been slowly growing, at the time I thought politics couldnt get more divisive, online censorship was kicking off, and branding got really gray. Sadly, it's just been downhill ever since. I think 2020 made everyone yearn for 2016, but everyone hated it while it was happening. I miss the world before the 2016 election, and especially before the 2012 election. 

i was 7 with unrestricted access to internet so i was just being straight up groomed by randos online... not fun... 

I was 9, and had stolen one of dad's old phones to watch YouTube unsupervised on. 

I watched FNAF gameplays, and Pokèmon anime Ash x Misty AMVs, and I had downloaded a bunch of weird otome dating sim games, so I'd go down to the park near the house we'd just moved into and sit behind a tree and use the stolen phone...

Good times LOL

it was lonely in this year (´• ω •`) but fun things happened on the internet, and got to draw characters a lot during this year

2016 was a wild ride for me. I was still in active addiction - alcoholism. I was freshly 22 years old, stuck in/just left an abusive relationship that revolved around drinking. I went into the hospital on March 2nd, 2016, and I was so sick, mentally and physically, that they put me in a cab and shipped me off to detox.

I spent 14 days in treatment, got sober, and started reconnecting with myself. I had to relearn who I was and, honestly, who I wanted to be. It was hard and I put a lot of work into myself. Thank the lord for that.

When I look back at 2016, I remember a little 22 year old girl who was struggling with herself, trying to find her way back to who she really was and becoming the person she always strived to be.

Besides that lovely tidbit, in 2016 I loved Spotify, Tumblr, watching terrible Netflix specials, going to AA, working the 12 steps, and working as a certified mua. 

I still can't believe it's been 10 years lmao. How am I closer to 40 then I am to 20??

I think I would've been 21? I think it was 2016 where I was hurt. I've been struggling ever since.

Oh, interesting question. At the time, I was 10 years old; far too young to grasp the global political situation beyond a surface level. During that year I spent 90% of my time playing Minecraft and Five Nights at Freddy's, LOL.

I did meet my BFF that year though, and we have been friends ever since then.

2016 was a weird year for me. It, frankly, was the beginning of numerous things compounding, that would last 7-8 years of me feeling really lost in life. The beginning of 2016 was the start of my junior year in college and my best friend had just passed away in a car accident in December of 2015. I already didn't really want to be in college but didn't know what else to do with my life. I couldn't really focus in class after the death of my best friend, I was doing my classwork but not really trying very hard, I was doing a piss-poor job at making friends, already being really asocial amplified by everything else going on, and having relationship issues with my abusive ex-girlfriend. By the fall I had to really lock in and work hard until I graduated in 2019 to save my GPA. 2016 was really the beginning of a low point that lasted until really about 3-ish years ago that I'm still trying to crawl out of.

Started high school that year. Felt like I was thrown into the middle of a massive shift both politically and online. I just started getting a grasp on politics, and discussions of the election were EVERYWHERE! The day Trump won the election, everybody in my class freaked out. Watching the whole thing play out made me lose faith in the system before I was even legally able to vote. 

The internet also became far more mainstream at this point. As such, this is when many of the modern issues with the internet began. Drama content was all over the place. People had to be far more careful about what they said online. Ads, ads, and more ads. There were still memes though. Classic memes were still a thing, but were dying off for the more surreal ones. For a while everyone was obsessed with Harambe, and that was a source of memage. I didn't really care. Never got into too much mainstream stuff. All the guys were dressed like hypebeasts, wearing endless Supreme gear and other designer brands. Listerine breath strips were trendy as well. We'd pop them like candy.

As for me personally, earlier in the year I got my second autism diagnosis. I got my first one in early 2013 before the DSM-V took over[before ASD was a formal diagnosis], but my parents were in some degree of denial, so I was sent off to a special institution focused on neurological disorders in minors. The second diagnosis didn't surprise anyone. I also wanted to dress emo then, but my then stepmom wouldn't let me. She basically picked out my wardrobe for me, and I hated it. She wanted me to dress just like her, wearing boho chic and casual clothes, when I wanted to wear jeans and t shirts. She sucked for more reasons but I don't want to get into them.

This was also the year I figured out the asexual part of myself. I was unfamiliar with the concept prior, but the LGBTQ+ was really gaining strength at this point. I came out that year. My dad wasn't surprised. I guess me being more disintested in dating than both my brothers when they were my age was a dead giveaway.