The school cafeteria is hell.

Post Reply New Topic

Some people chew with their mouths open (which I honestly think is elementary school behavior, I mean we're in high school!) and the only thing edible there is the nachos, so I just get them every day.
Otherwise, it's alright, but one time some kids yelled at each other and got into a fight which ended up bringing the cafeteria security over to them.

Back when I went to public highschool, (I'm trying to make online schooling work.) the cafeteria was the one place that I couldn't stand. And it was mainly the noise, the smell, and the amount of people.

There's something about the sound of a thousand people talking at once that absolutely makes my ears try to sew themselves shut. It's the most horrible noise I know of. Nails on a chalkboard? Tolerable. Crying baby? God help me. CAFETERIA CROWD: I have died and this is the punishment the gods found suitable for me. Perhaps I was a chatterbox in a previous life.

The smell of food in general is nauseating for me. Especially bad or cheap food. The first time I ever threw up in school was in elementary school. I had the strange idea of trying to eat a school lunch. It was a dry, undercooked lump of bendy spaghetti that tasted of raw flour, covered in a sickeningly sweet tomato sauce and topped with the most abominable cheese known to man, which in my case was Parmesan.

I had been drinking the chocolate milk out of one of those straw-insert-bags that they keep in the cold box- there were usually ice crystals in the milk because they didn't care about the temperature setting. After gulping 16 ounces of chocolate milk, I took a single bite of this spaghetti, grimaced, tried to shove it down despite every synapse in my brain screaming to spit it out, and after it got into my esophagus, I promptly deployed a public health emergency onto the cafeteria floor.

On top of all this, being around large amounts of people I don't know is distressing for some reason. My blood pressure goes through the roof when seeing lots of people who don't know me, aren't my friend, are all talking to eachother, all know eachother, and are being quite loud at it. It feels like I'm about to pass out from stress.

Also, first post.

I am thankfully allowed to eat my "lunch" (I'm too nervous to eat in school, so I typically eat an apple, an orange, a bag of mixed berries, or occasionally a kiwi or a banana) in a quiet office. When for some reason I cannot eat in the office-- and I know that this may not sound pleasant-- I may eat in the biggest stall in the restroom. I don't like the cafeteria, because of the high sound sensitivity that I have. I also can, in "my" little haven, focus on my personal reading or writing, use the computer to research or type an essay, do homework, or simply take a nap. However, next school year, I am "resetting" my internal "I can't handle my sensory overload meter" and am going to try sitting in it more often-- even though I have no friends, thus making it unenjoyable.

You're not allowed to eat anywhere else but in the cafeteria in my school.

Luckily most people avoid sitting near me. I feel very uncomfortable when I'm surrounded by students.

you have my pity.

if that rule were suddenly to be enforced here, i think everyone would go insane. we eat literally anywhere around campus and off campus, and thus the actual cafeteria ends up begin rather tame.

So happy to be Australian.

Most of our schools aren't one big building but rather a collection of buildings across the school grounds.

Many Australian schools don't even have two-storey school buildings at all but mine did.

Otherwise there is no set cafeteria at most aussie schools.

There is a tuckshop/cafeteria where you buy your food, and then where you sit is up to you.

I've been to three high schools and the first two you only bought lunch at the tuckshop but couldn't sit near it, the third there were seats situated near the tuckshop but you weren't forced to sit at them.

Otherwise you could sit wherever the heck you want except for out of bounds areas, being classrooms and near classroom entrances.

There were many courtyards and nice, open-public spaces to sit. Feels far more liberating when you can eat and explore at the same-time almost every corner and area of the school-grounds.

this was mine. i remember sitting with a group of juniors as a freshman on a dirt floor by the front of the school, around a hole in the ground. food scraps went in there. the "pit worm" would feed in there.

i remember one day after a rain, the hole was fulled with mud. i was playing with it with my mudproof shoe. my crush/future limerent object and her boyfriend were kissing nearby. either my foot slipped, or it hit a bubble in the mud and it sprayed all over her pants.

i felt like the smallest person in the universe. she gave me a hug and sent me into a downwards spiral that i would not begin to recover from until the present day.

Thankfully, I don't eat at the cafeteria. I haven't eaten there since Grade 9.

haven't eaten there (regularly) since...never.

only use for my high school cafeteria was snagging breakfast after my morning track meets, senior year.

This whole thread encompasses the reason why I use headphones while eating because of sound sensitivities.