Depression and what it's really like

I've been on fluoxetine for ages. I was talking with my doctors about phasing off, but then I went through all sorts of stress with my mother. Plus my gynecologist said that Prozac seems to help women in perimenopause and menopause.

One element is that suddenly I've come back to life sexually, after being dead inside for ages. It might be frightening if it wasn't so annoying. Apart from everything else, there's no one in my life and I've forgotten how to meet people.

I've been going to work bc for assistance with getting back to work and unfortunately the case manager has made my mental health a hurdle. She told me that I could see a vocational counsellor if I wanted to but it wouldn't impede whether I met the job developers (who promote you to companies). Anyways, I asked her if the job developers reveal mental health information and she said I would have to meet them and ask. As money and time are tight I asked her to try to schedule a meeting with the job devs. She went and asked them about availability, came back and said my health was a barrier and I would need to see the vocational counsellor after all, which was scheduled over a week from now. I told her that this process has done more harm than good and left. I am ready to work, it's these clueless attitudes about mental health that suck

I'm doing my best to pull through, but I'm so hungry at this point that I don't think I have the energy to do this anymore. Food pantries have such utterly disgusting garbage that I can't eat that stuff. I can barely eat fast food without wanting to throw my guts up, let alone the processed canned Steve Brule atrocities they have there.

Being on a literal death spiral is kind of cool, though. It'll be nice to add my corpse to the pile for everyone else's comfort and luxury. I wish there was a way out of this, but in America, there just isn't. It's a shame all of my hard work was for nothing.

Ross, that's awful. It's ridiculous and stupid that employers still get to get away with non-specific discrimination based on behavioral health issues when there are clear grounds for suit if they try the same stunts with physically disabled people. Not comparing suffering, but it bears mention.

carpet_kaiser - hang on, man. We care about you

El - That's a good point you mention. The outcome of this scenario is I took a one hour cool down, came back and asked that my depression not prevent me from seeing a job developer. My case manager went and brought the job developer in and he said that he was sorry that it may have come across as discrimination and that it was up to me to see a vocational counsellor. Which is fucked up, because my case manager led me to believe it was a necessity by outright telling me you need to see a VC first?? I dunno what happened here, maybe a change of heart, but it was ultimately frustrating.

The best counter to depression I find is reminding yourself why it's worth it. Family, friends, this place, music/movies - bright lights in the worst of times.

yeah, that never works for me in deep depression because I usually get the anhedonia where no music or movies sound interesting and family and friends are the people I feel I've let down!

usually getting myself away from the normal routine does it, remembering to exercise, going for a long walk or even drive, going to a different place helps a little

It's a really bad day when I can't even pick up my guitar.

Today is one of those days.

mh - sometimes i tell myself things to believe things to improve the life situation but yeah a lot of the feeling i've left people down is somewhere in the background anyways.

austin - if that means so much to ya i'd wish you'd just pick it up even to tune it/play something, no matter what is.

Trying to figure out how to proceed ... right now I'm just trying to accept things and move on.

I have to read stuff like this to find people who "get" what it's like:At the Mind's Limits: Contemplations by a Survivor on Auschwitz and its Realities

What kind of therapy is out there for stuff like that? What therapist would be willing to put their own well-being on the line to help someone like me? I have no idea. This seems like a job only I can do that I have to personally come to terms with alone. It ain't easy!

I met a woman at work I want to ask out, but my life is such a mess that I've been pushing her away... but it feels like one of those opportunities I shouldn't let pass me by. I just don't have the money or health right now to do it, and she's about to give up on me. What a cruel joke.

Whoever has succumbed to torture can no longer feel at home in the world. The shame of destruction cannot be erased. Trust in the world, which already collapsed in part at the first blow, but in the end, under torture, fully, will not be regained. That one’s fellow man was experienced as the antiman remains in the tortured person as accumulated horror. It blocks the view into a world in which the principle of hope rules. One who was martyred is a defenseless prisoner of fear. It is fear that henceforth reigns over him. ―Jean Amery

Yup, that's pretty much it.

Have you read Viktor Frankl? Man's Search for Meaning. Go check it out I think you'd get a lot out of it.

Yeah, I've got that one on audio book. Maybe I'll listen to it again soon.

It's like there's this strange dual reality going on. I still feel love in my heart, and I still have a sense of humor and fun. I still have some hope for my life left. Yet I carry this burden of terrifying knowledge about humanity, society, and the world that's out of step with everyone else. My frame of experience is real, yet it's not "real" in the world as far as shared experience goes and the way society and relationships are structured.

I just have to accept that I'll never be "normal" and I'll always be out of step in the world. Which is permanent and I have no power to change. I grew up in enforced social isolation which nearly drove me insane, and I'll always be socially isolated because of my experiences. Not to mention being crippled in so many other ways to make living a "normal" life difficult.

What an act of incredible, mind-shattering cruelty, all for a bunch of laughs. For laughs! For a bunch of shits and giggles. Oh well, maybe through some miracle of self-will I can pull it together, ask out that woman, and everything will be hunky dory, skipping through fields of flowers and critters in the sunshine. I'm not sure how much I should laugh about that one.

Anyway, enough on my own dark-ass life.

carry that hope, carpet, it's very important

Thanks. My main hope now is getting food to eat, which probably won't happen for another two weeks, and I'm probably going to faint from hunger. But that's just something you have to accept about life in the US.

It's definitely putting a wrench in my plans to find a new job.

Try to locate a food bank in your area.

I looked a few up and they aren't open past working hours, so that's a no go, and none of them are near me. I don't qualify for any safety net benefits since I make too much money, am single with no kids, and yet not enough to ya know, eat! So that's pretty funny.

I just have to tough it out.

It's weird, the food pantries around here only serve people who are "referred" by agencies and churches, others require SNAP. We have a damn miserable safety net in this country.

Falling from the bourgie class has really opened my eyes to how fucking fucked this country is for a lot of people. God damn! I could very well die in this situation and there's nothing to stop me.

So yeah, food banks are clearly an option cut off to me. I'll figure something out.

yeah..i mean..i've been unemployed for 4 months, essentially have no money and bills left n right and don't know how I'll pay next months rent. Not sure what's keeping me going but the human spirit is a weird thing

Don't give up, let that survival instinct bring out a side of you that you may not know you have. It's a sad state of affairs in our country right now, though ... you're not alone seeing this side of things. It's ghastly.

thanks carpet!

as for therapists and their ability to work with a variety of clients...

I have a friend who has been seeing a local therapist, who I gather is semi-retired, that charges a sliding scale for services. After a few sessions, the therapist's background came up. She used to do analysis for the court system, determining competency, building profiles, that kind of thing. She worked in Utah, and one of her cases to profile was Ted Bundy

if someone who has dealt with Ted Bundy can work with a variety of clients, and do well with it, then no, there's no fear you're untreatable or overwhelming therapist. People have shitty lives and complex circumstances, and it's not on you to boil that down. That's their job.

Some of them are pretty goddamn good at it, you just have to stop thinking you're smarter and have a better handle on your life than all therapists. Most therapists go to another therapist to talk through their own feelings about the job and how it affects their lives.

Once I get my feet back on the ground, maybe I'll give it another shot. Seeing what the bottom floor in the US looks like, and how it's greased up to ease the slide into it... it's terrifying! I'm getting my shit together ASAP. I don't want another lifetime of misery after I worked so fucking hard to get out of my original circumstances.

Ross, do the same, man, you got a good heart, the world needs people like you, now more than ever!

Thank you all for listening to my weird, dark shit, and offering some good feedback.

thanks carpet, that's nice of you to say

i appreciate your posts and am glad to see you have some hope

I hope you have hope, too, your life is valuable. It is to me, at least.

:) back atcha

Man, I don't even have the money to get to work next week. My life is a joke. This is the end of the road for me, I guess. I put up a damn good fight, I think, made it way beyond anyone's expectations. So that's good at least.

Blechh, I'll figure out something. I don't know how the hell I'm going to do it, but what choice do I have, eh? Dead or solution.

It's just shocking how easy it is to die easily preventable deaths in this country, and nobody gives a fuck. We've become a nation of ghouls and monsters.

Hopefully history has a positive outcome and the United States will sit alongside Nazi Germany for the level of evil our philosophy and way of life represents. And I'm only saying this because I lost my life to this shit, and it was so easily prevented. So understand it from that angle.

Hey Carpet, so if you can't get to work, what are you going to do? quit, or tell your employer you can't?

No idea. Maybe I'll see if I can go freelance and work from home, maybe renegotiate my salary to a proper level. These guys are pretty scummy, so I don't see an overwhelmingly positive outcome here.

This pinch is only for the next two weeks, so I just have to make it til then. But it's two weeks where I can die or lose my job and become homeless. Life sure is interesting in the US.

It's my fault, though. My fault for being born to the life I was and struggling with it, and then getting illegal shit done to me at my last job, and having to quit before it killed me, with no safety net to catch me.

Man. I'm also a little loopy from not eating for two days straight, so bear with me here.

yeah not sure what else to say, depression hitting hard today. I'm tired of feeling like this

It's cool, I've been living under the shadow of death my whole life, and living in the US isn't much different from that. I'm adapted for it.

I hope I didn't bring you down ... I'll be OK, and you will be, too.

nah you didn't carpet

going to start seeing this nurse/counsellor i've seen in the past, she has a heart of gold and meets me outside of work, which is amazing.

i drink about 4-6 beers a day, going to probably sober up until i'm out of this mess. going to accept the fact that I need help, I don't want to feel like this and my mind often lies to me to keep me in similar scenarios. I would like to get better at repairing the glitches in my mind - the bad programming - the mixed signals.

Go for it. I never had anything like that, so you're lucky.

Sorry for bitching and moaning here, I should probably just get this over with with more honor.

(no, I'm not going to kill myself)

Ross, I'm not here to preach the virtues of sobriety, because I'm still an absolute mess. But, quitting drinking and just not relying on it anymore was definitely a positive change for me.

right on, Austin. Yeah substance abuse compounds depression, and it can be easy to believe it's helping me function/survive. Hopefully seeing this through will just make things a bit easier overall

Think I've touched on this previously in here, but quitting drinking was really easy for me because I didn't like it anymore. Of all the cliches about getting sober, I think the one that was most true for me was that I couldn't stop until I actually wanted to. Even at some points, I knew my drink habit was totally out of control, but I continued to drink because I didn't have the intention of quitting. It wasn't until I was ready to quit that I actually could.

OK, I'm doing better now, and looks like I'll make it a little further.

It's funny ... the only people who've ever really helped me were black people, gay people, Jewish people, Muslims, teachers, and assorted misfit weirdos like myself. Yet people from my own class, race, and general background have been the first to stomp on my hands while I was holding for dear life, or at least enjoyed watching me fall to my death. Wonder what's up with that.

Fun armchair sociology. Anyway, the important thing is all's good ... for now.

Good to hear carpet :)

met this woman who lives in my building and she's super nice, and we had a good laugh walking home. Turns out she's a therapist though, which is almost too perfect

is there such a thing as omnicidal depression? i don't neg on myself like i used to and i think suicide is stupid, selfish, and pointless, but every day that passes, particularly when i'm feeling depressed, human extinction seems like a better idea.

I'm not sure if omnicidal depression ever had that particular label attached to it, but I think it is definitely 'a thing'. Congratulations! You are an phrase-maker of genuine talent, even if one or two people managed to get there independently ahead of you.

Does anyone have any advice on getting through the next day or so? I have my annual review at work tomorrow (I HATE IT I HATE IT I HATE IT). I want to leave this job, but I still have enough self-control not to burn bridges...right now.

sometimes i go through stretches where i feel like that is every day for me. just gotta remember how many times i've felt like that and how i'm still alive somehow.

I apologize for my tomfoolery on here, I think I'm going through some kind of "great awakening" about all the nutso shit I posted on this thread. It's not fun, I'll tell ya that. And it's not funny, either, to the people who think it is. Cripes.

So yeah, I think I need to go "under construction" while I get this shit sorted out...

Annual review process makes me a total nervous wreck and ironically ruins my job performance for at least a month leading up to it

I need some advice. Had a great interview for a good job recently and the employer has asked me to submit 2-3 references. The first reference from the past was solid and he told me the employer sounded interested in me. But my last boss at my former job won't supply me a reference, he won't even respond to my e-mails. I'm trying not to get down because my last job was terrible for my mental health and it's sad that the former job is still causing problems in me returning to work.