19,483 here, and that’s just my main email. 💀
For what it’s worth I think it’s just because I use email in my browser and with no notifications, so I don’t feel the urge to clear my notifications like I would with a phone app. Also at some point once it got stupidly large I decided I wanted to see how high it could get just for fun.
I struggle with this a lot, it doesn’t help that I have crippling social anxiety so I already feel nervous about reaching out, then proceed to forget, then feel 10x as nervous because I feel guilty about my delayed response. All of that results in me not responding for even longer and making it worse.
Then I finally respond, feel so rubbish about the whole thing that it takes me forever to respond again.
So many of my online friendships have turned into basically penpal type arrangements because I get so delayed with my responses because of this.