Depression and what it's really like

mookie, I know "<3" doesn't hack it. But <3.
Also, in the spirit of the cancer thread, fuck depression. Also silby otm.

Stress is really turning my brain to mush, but they say they'll move me next week. Can't believe how much progress has been undone so quickly.

man dowd I don't know what to say other than "much love" :(

i'm starting to give up on ever getting back to where I was in my early 30s. I've never exactly been a completely calm individual, no, but I'd reached some kind of equilibrium where I was calm most of the time and at peace. no OCD symptoms, no raging existentialist blues that lasted longer than a day.

now I feel like everything i do is wrong. and that's not an exaggeration - even facts I know I am right about I find myself double checking because I feel convinced that I'm a walking trainwreck.

Sunday I was in a weird frame of mind, ran into someone by chance I briefly had dated but am no longer interested in, and instead of just being polite, I made out with her. and regretted it after.

just a ball of rage 24/7 and much of it inwardly focused. i've missed half my therapy sessions this year due to work and/or travel and I don't think that's a coincidence.

the thing that worries me the most is last year, when I felt this way, I was actively under a lot of stress in my work and personal life. that's all gone away - the antagonizing stressors are gone but I'm not healing this time like usual. I'm just....stuck. i worry about my health to hypochondriac levels which brings on panic attacks.

tonight work was more stressful than usual but i got through it and was all ready to relax and go to a movie when I couldn't find my wallet fora n hour and now I'm just sitting here breathing slowly, ready to give it a second try in two hours.

on the plus side I have a breast cancer benefit next week that i'm helping perform in........

dowd, that sucks so bad - depression is bad enough, hard enough to deal with, but external factors that keep you unstable and on uneven footing are just straws waiting to break the camel's back. i'm so sorry that you're being forced into such a totally shit situation. i really hope something works out and you're able to get back on track.

fwiw, there was a time just after my dad's death when having a cat was one of my mom's biggest reasons to stay alive

yes, much <3 to you mookie, my friend <3

many thanks to Lyle for keeping you alive, because i want you to stay alive

A cat is a perfectly good reason to stay alive, imo.

agreed. my cats are the best thing that ever happened to me

my cat is like my only real friend

I haven't seem my dog for a fortnight now (some of you may remember me having a breakdown and posting tons of crap in one of the threads - best animal friends maybe). He had an operation just before I had to move - nothing serious, but miserable cone-head times. My mums looking after him. Could do with hugging him atm. But sooner or later, no doubt. I might try and Skype with him later.

<3 hugs <3

thanks guys <3

yesterday i read about a retired hockey player who was going to kill himself because he was having blackouts and seizures from all the concussions, but then his dog came in and he was all 'wait, who will take care of my dog?' so he stopped. (unfortunately his dog was named 'coors', but still)

best of everything to you dowd <3

You too, mookie.

big Love to all

<3 to all the ppl itt

i like having all of you around.

I'm very depressed but I'm afraid to write anything about it because I once wrote about it (on another thread) only to have an ILXer make fun of me for it. It was devastating. This thread seems really supportive, though. You all seem nice. But I'm afraid of it happening again.

You're safe here dude

Ppl take this thread very seriously - anyone being an actual dick here would get booted out asap.

Thanks guys. I really appreciate your kindness.

I think about jumping off a local, famous suspension bridge many times a day. I'm not sure if I am serious about it or am just being stupid.

I have made a lot of mistakes and need to make a lot of life changes but I don't know where I will get the energy or motivation. I've been thinking about turning to religion, like alcoholics do, but have no idea what that would actually entail or if I would be forced to adopt a worldview I don't really want to have. Staying deliberately vague here.

don't do it

any worldview you might adopt that leads you through to better times is worth adopting imo. "any port in a storm" has been, for me, a phrase of profound usefulness

it's a bit of a lucky dip but there are plenty of church ppl out there who have an open door and will speak to you in a pastoral/therapeutic role without much or any god chat

^^ and some of them have really nice music

"any port in a storm" has been, for me, a phrase of profound usefulness

i like this.

Started seeing therapist again a couple weeks ago.

Glad I did so.

Moving to a single flat on Monday, and get to see my dog today! Now I just need to find a way to get my meds when I'm not registered to a GP...

right on!

I'm so glad, dowd!

dowd I am glad you will be back in a home

Good news, dowd! I hope your new flat works out well for you and that you got some good dog time in yesterday (oh, and your meds)

things have gotten pretty bad. i don't know where this self-critical/lacerating voice comes from. i don't remember my parents ever talking to me the way i talk to myself. i am starting with a new therapist and stuff so i guess i will be fine.

i guess i am just mystified about where depression comes from. it's so maladaptive. it's stood in the way of so many things i wanted in life: jobs, relationships, educational opportunities. why is it there?

Starts in your brain, then you grow up and adapt to it by instinct without knowing what's happening, then you have the maladaptive thought patterns and the maladaptive coping mechanisms you built around them. Then you try to undo it all a bit at a time.

it's the most annoying, stupidest bullshit in the world.

Even relatively well-behaved brains can be annoying as hell.

the worst part of depression for me is the guilt. my parents are getting older and they shouldn't have to worry about me anymore.

they shouldn't have to worry about me anymore

I'm 61 and I still have to worry about my daughter who is turning 30 in a few weeks. She isn't to blame in any way for that. She can't take care of herself and she never will be able to. She didn't choose to be disabled, but I chose to be a parent, so I accept this as exactly what I signed up for. I would no more want to walk away from that job than I'd want to cut off my right hand. I love her.

I expect you have loving, caring, responsible parents, treesh. They signed up for being your parents and if they love you as they ought, they'll tell you they'll tell you truly and sincerely that there is no time limitation on that. It's part of the deal.

Yes, it may be inconvenient for them at times that you are still struggling to make your way, but compared to what you required from them for the first 10 years, I'm sure you are miles more competent and capable of self care and self guidance.

You aren't guilty of anything if you haven't somehow turned your life into a cakewalk by now. Life is hard and you can only do your best. Do that and you are acing the course.

aimless otm

I don't think I've ever explicitly talked about it here, but about five years ago, I moved back in with my mom for a year and change after a Job-like succession of bad shit happened within a shockingly short period of time and I pretty much lost the ability to properly take care of myself or care whether I could properly take care of myself. I have enough distance now to see that time as not just NBD but what I had to do in order to be well again, but at the time and for a good stretch afterward, I felt ashamed and guilty to have essentially reverted twenty years (back in the same house and room and bed as when I was in high school, with my mom having to take care of me again). Those feelings are probably perfectly natural, but aimless knows what he's talking about. The people who care about you will be there for you when you really need them the most. It comes with the gig. My mom was perfectly happy to be there for me at that time. If it helps alleviate the guilt, do like I did and provide a huge amount of free labor in the service of upgrading your parents' property value. But, coming from the master of masochism, try to take it easy on yourself. Everybody hits those emotional skids at one time or another, whether they're willing to admit it or not. You're just a human being like all the rest of us.

that self-critical voice is always a liar, but depression is trying to alert you to something profoundly not right between you and the world. underneath the bullying voice i think is you trying to talk to yourself and depression is the opportunity to listen to that, if you can just get past the mean bullshit that's screaming for unwarranted attention

something about indulging your needs in the right way, i dunno

take care Treesh

the worst part of depression for me is the guilt. my parents are getting older and they shouldn't have to worry about me anymore.

my mother still worries that I will get into a serious car accident that is my fault, because I did this a few times as a teenager. We're talking 25 years ago. Your parents have agency, they will worry if they want to worry.

But in terms of "having to take care you now that you're an adult" ... obviously different parents have different degrees of emotional, financial, etc. resources to do so. I don't know enough about them to say, "no, it will be no hardship at all, they would be as gracious as Aimless is/was with his daughter." If you have a good relationship with them, talk to them about it. If they aren't assholes, they will probably tell you flattering, nice, hopeful things about yourself and your potential that could make you feel less depressed. Idk.

but most people are assholes, so...

The guilt of some of my actions when unwell can't be alleviated. There's nothin I can do to make it up to them (my mother resuscitated me once, for example - I can't imagine the fear of that). And they say to forget about if, that it's not my fault etc. But
That guilt will always be there. I do use it as a way to motivate myself to not hurt myself. But you can't wallow in guilt, and the people you feel guilt towards wouldn't want that either.

trapped in a box rapidly filling with water and there's fuck all outside the box anyway

been trying to juggle a lot of different things for a long time and feel like i'm headed for a huge crash. was supposed to graduate college last semester, but it didn't happen because of a paperwork fuckup. so this month i'm trying to graduate college, pass my professional cert exam (based on material i haven't even looked at in a year), manage two jobs, one of which is a kafkaesque nightmare and one of which is a ridiculously overtaxing ball of stress that leaves me incapable of doing anything at the end of the day but falling in bed and sleeping (and they're asking me to do overtime). on top of this trying to close out my dad's estate. everybody i talk to seems just as fucked up as i am, or more. have been doing massive amounts of stress eating, which has gone far past the point of being productive. am completely neglecting my loving and supportive spouse, and in fact have become so sexually alienated from everything over the last year i'm starting to think i'm genderqueer.

oh and i turned forty yesterday.

i've already had one nervous breakdown. i really don't want another.

Hello all, long-time poster/reader but under my real name and tbh I don't want to discuss mental health using my real name - hope no-one minds.

Hope everyone in the thread is doing ok at the moment, there's always something outside the box NV.

I find it hard to talk about how I feel, so little things become massive things and I can't see a positive outcome of any situation - I used to think I was just being a realist and preparing myself for the worst but all this catastrophising has been destroying me really. My current bout has just been a really slow slide down over about 18mths from my father (estranged) dying, some stressful things happening in my relationship (exacerbated by my inability to open up, as much as I wanted to) and a general collapse in my self belief and personality as a whole. I think I was in denial how bad it was. I found thinking about suicide a rational option when faced with trying to confront anything emotionally difficult - if I was going to go through with it I'd have done so by now.

Eventually I managed to start an email dialogue with the Samaritans, and eventually spoke to friends then my sister then went to the doctor (now got meds at a sustainable level, and after 4 months wait I have an appt for assessment with adult psych services this week) and started seeing a private counsellor. Ended up in tears on Christmas day trying to explain to my Mum. Relationship stuff came to a head not long after and although there's some contact we've not been in the same room for months.

So sometimes I'm pretty ok and other times just totally empty. I live on my own, and commute, neither of which help. I feel like I have nothing to be depressed about, so find it hard to look for help. Other people have real problems, mines are existential and the same shit that's been knocking me over for 20-odd years. I'm mostly less anxious, which is good, but definitely a bit lost. Not sure how the assessment will go, I'm worried about being told there's nothing wrong with me and to be on my way.

i've already had one nervous breakdown. i really don't want another.

Oh, I know that one! I spent most of last year in fear of any sort of further breakdown! Which didn't help.