For some reason my mind is really hypersensitive towards loneliness/isolation/darkness, anyone else feel the same? Makes a lot of atmospheres/places hard to live in sometimes. (deserts, empty forests, etc) Sometimes I get depressed because of the overwhelming feeling of loneliness/isolation/darkness. I'm working on changing my perspective, but it's been like that for a long time now.
I haven't had quite the same experience, TheAutomator, but I think it's really interesting, and definitely worth exploring. It seems to me that a sensitivity like that must have come from somewhere, and finding out where may be an illuminating journey.
I am quite phobic to loneliness, but I've learned a lot in trying to explore what creates that sense of loneliness in myself - because sometimes I feel totally alone when I'm in a large group and other times I feel a sense of togetherness even when I'm technically alone. It's strange.
I have none, but never said it was entirely impossible. Stranger things have happened, but it's highly unlikely. I'm a very unremarkable individual. I've always felt incompatible with the world around me. I'm simple unable to properly function within it. Tried for many years in different environments, but I cannot do it. If by resources you mean therapy and the like I've already gave that a good go, but no revelations or breakthroughs to be had there.
But thanks for acknowledging me and many others with your mega posts here, you do good work.
Well, one could argue that when we're in a place of suffering we don't necessarily have the most balanced perspective on what is or is not likely to transpire. What was your experience with therapy?
Thank you for responding Piano. I was able to sleep a little more last night and I feel much better today. With the klonopin effects wearing off my judgement seems much more clear and I'm not having any suicidal thoughts. But I will say that taking more klonopin sounds really enticing right now. Phone calls in particular cause me to panic and so the idea of calling a hotline if I was in that position again scares me.
I'm not seeing a therapist anymore, but I think I try and hide everything out of fear of being judged. Also when I say things that feel embarrassing, I won't be able to stop thinking about and it'll keep me up at night. I don't like talking to therapists because I don't know them, I don't trust them and it makes me uncomfortable. I also find it hard to come up with the words on the spot.
Well, co1onel, the hope with any therapeutic relationship is that over time you will come to trust the therapist and thus become more comfortable and less embarrassed sharing things. Of course, the path to get there is one of discomfort, but ultimately, it seems that most growth in life, in whatever realm, relies on us being comfortable with being uncomfortable to some extent.
As far as coming up with words, there are a few ways to help that along, such as journaling your feelings over the course of each week and then simply reading the journal entries at each appointment as a means of beginning discussion (I have done this many, many times). Also, an increased comfort / trust level may naturally ease your ability to communicate.
The job of a therapist is to be a resource and a support and not to judge while doing so. I hope you can reconsider seeking treatment - these problems are tremendously difficult and each additional pillar we can add to our circle of support eases the weight by quite a lot.
I found this to be a
pretty cool list of resources. Has anybody ever tried any of these apps?
I haven't tried them before, thanks for the link WD!
Damn, there's a ton...
Aw shucks, it's another night where I can't sleep! Sometimes my med helps me sleep but I get uncomfortable side effects from it. Hopefully I'll see my psych Doctor tomorrow and he'll be nice enough to help me change medication.
I hope your appointment went well, whiterabbit!
So, over the past few days I've had time to reflect, and I am feeling a little bit better about myself now. Until now, every meaningful social activity I do with friends had been a test for mea test of whether or not I would be accepted or shunned. And every time I passed a part of the test, I felt amazing, because my friends were validating me.
I wanted to keep feeling amazing, so I tried to always be the person that my friends wanted, which wasn't always the person I actually was. In contrast to how I viewed myself, I viewed my friends as near-perfect in comparison. All the social and emotional things I was bad at, they'd figured out perfectly already, and I needed to model myself off of them if I wanted to have friends too.
Eventually, though, I realized that I didn't really need to worry about my closest friends judging me. I didn't have to be perfect around them, because even at times when I screwed up, they still wanted to be my friends! So gradually I let my guard down.
But just as I was feeling more comfortable exposing my flaws, I also started noticing more flaws in my friends. Attributes of them that I wouldn't want to model. Now I realized I couldn't just copy all their behaviors and feel validated. Since my friends were just human now instead of "amazing perfect beings" their positive reactions to my actions carried much less weight. If they had flaws of their own, then how could I count on them to point out mine? And when I realized I couldn't get that amazing feeling of validation, I got depressed again.
Eventually I realized the only way for me to reconcile my need for validation with my desire not to copy all of my friends' behaviors. I need to validate myself, to like who I am without needing someone else to like me first. This isn't going to be easy, but I'm feeling more comfortable with the idea of it all now.
So now I'm trying to find purpose in my life that doesn't solely involve pleasing others. My psychiatrist helped me list some general goals and values I have, which will be helpful for me to lean on when I feel the pressure to do what my friends want instead of what I want.
I'd say "girlfriend figure" is exactly the right term, Piano. I feel like getting validation from my (female) best friend is different from getting validation from my guy friends for a few reasons. First, it just feels less socially acceptable to be emotionally vulnerable with other men, and for whatever reason, I feel more at ease being open in that way around women, whereas I feel weirder being that open with men. Maybe it's just society conditioning us, maybe it reminds us of maternal comfort from childhood; I have no idea.
Second, it feels like way more of a confidence booster (for me at least) to be friended by a girl than by a guy. Most of us probably have a bit more experience with making friends with the same gender than with the opposite. When I make a female friend, I initially have so many anxious (and probably irrational) thoughts. Is she going to think I'm hitting on her and be disgusted? Is she going to dislike me because I'm unattractive to her? So when I do have the courage to make a female friend, getting her to affirm my self worth is way more meaningful than when a guy says something nice to me.
Holy mother of god the bolded is something I could've written verbatim! I feel those things, too!
It's been interesting over the past couple of years reflecting on the way I function in platonic relationships with women. A lot of it must go back to my relationship with my mother, but I'm still trying to work through that. At the very least, though, I'm glad that I'm
able to have platonic relationships with women - I know some men who simply are not able to, either because they're not comfortable doing so or always catch feelings.
So, what I'm trying to say is that the exploration you're doing right now - and everything you typed out - is tremendously valuable, and I hope you're able to keep looking, feeling, and learning. None of us want to suffer, game_boy, but it seems to me that the most we can do is try to learn from the muck while we're in it. After all there are a lot of lessons on life and self one can only learn from the pits.
Feel free to share any more thoughts you arrive at in the future, because it really has been wonderful reading the extended thoughts of someone whose social musings are not too far from my own.
Why was I born like this? It's not fucking fair.
Born like what, AK? I'm sorry you're suffering.
Had my first panic attack in almost 10 years today, in class, in the back row. I don't think anyone noticed, not even the girl beside me, but I wanted out so bad (couldn't leave without going over lots of people.) I got extremely nauseous, my legs were shaking, my heart was beating rapidly, I was dizzy, and I was sweating bullets. I felt scorching hot, like I was in a sauna, and I was lightheaded. My whole body was shaking.
I'll never forget that feeling of heat, that was something else, made me feel trapped more than anything. Had to roll up my sleeves.
I looked it up and those hot flashes are unrelated to low hormone hot flashes, which is good, but damn that was an intense feeling. Lasted 2-5 minutes, not sure how long. Afterwards I felt great though... I guess that was the adrenaline pumping.
Panic attacks are no joke, EHS. I'm glad you were able to make it through. Have you ever consulted a doctor about the panic attacks?
Totally on the verge to do something like jump off a bridge or something. Planned on just going home after work and watching legends of tomorrow but my friend wanted me to help him pick out a monitor for his PC. We ended up buying one at Costco and then we went to a resturant to eat. The place was dead and we were just eating until seated in eye shot of me was a gay couple and of course one of the guys was my type. I couldn't help but wonder why I can never meet anyone yet everyone else can. I couldn't talk I was so angry even now. My friend who is also gay said to me that one guy is totally my type and I gave him a death stare and he stopped talking. I know I will never met anyone ever and sometimes I wonder why I even exist why should I have to live in misery. It would be nice to make other people's lives just as miserable but I don't have it in me. I'd rather quietly die so no one bothers me and I don't bother anyone. I wish I can be addicted to drugs or alcohol and die of an overdose or something.
When you're in situations like the one you mentioned at dinner, are you able to connect with your friends at all about what you're feeling?
And I know I've done this a million times, but I feel compelled to again mention that the future is ultimately unknowable, unwritten and shaped by the infinite string of present moments we're living. Simply finding a partner will not fix our problems, but we can slowly chip away at them over time if we can only find the will to do so.
There was a guy at the squat rack today and took it for a long period of time. He had a beard. He was shorter than me. He bounced a ball for some reason.
I hated this man. I loathed him. I had a barbell in my hands I wanted to hit him repeatedly. I wanted to hurt this man so bad, I stopped my workout early.
It was weird. It was like I understood this man's life despite never seeing him at all before. It was like he was there to be a nuisance to me for that moment in time and I wanted to be rid of him.
I'm not a violent person, but I hate the fact thoughts like this come around to me. I don't fight against them though because I know they're a part of me, for better or for worse.
So, there are two things I want to comment on here:
(1) I have wrestled a lot over the past year with uncomfortable intrusive thoughts. Often times these thoughts didn't feel like they were mine - they were not connected to how I actually felt and seemingly came out of nowhere. Because of their content I was scared to open to anyone about them but, after talking to my therapist and doing some research, I was comforted to know that, well, a
lot of people have disturbing thoughts pop up sometimes. There's a big gap between having these sorts of thoughts and feeling the impulse to act upon them. If you
are feeling that impulse, that is also a very treatable issue, just a different one.
(2) I had a friend tell me last year that a favorite psychology professor told him once that "anger is our reaction to the experience of vulnerability." The more I have thought about this, the more it rings true. Any time I get angry at someone or something, I can eventually link it back to some sense of vulnerability it brings me. I get angry at others because they make me feel inferior, or make me feel unimportant, or things like that.
So I hope if you continue to have these thoughts you can see that they are toothless, and try to work backwards to any connections they may have to a sense of vulnerability. And if they aren't totally toothless - i.e. you are feeling the strong desire to act - then that is also a treatable issue, and I encourage you to seek help for both.
The evidence against free will is a lot of things, theres a great paper ill try to find that shows the brain makes decisions before you realize it does, all the lesion studies in mice and humans (brain structure changes cause personality changes), a few electrode studies in people with intractable epilepsy, the fact that mice can be almost sci-fi level controlled, no even potential mechanism for consciousness to affect brain function, etc. Basically its just the body of literature showing theres really no part of the brain that needs qualia/awareness to work and lots of evidence showing how molecules/physical phenomena does cause changes in what you experience/feelings. I'll try to find the papers I mentioned though if you are interested.
So this evidence point to there being
no free will? Like,
hard determinism might actually be true?
Scary. I'm interested to read whatever you can find!
Things have been weird for me the past couple of months. Haven't really been out of the house that frequently, stopped going to family events. Discussed it with my psychologist a few days ago and I'm going to speak to my psychiatrist about it next week. I think it was from changing my medication too much and too frequently. Hoping I'm able to get back to where I was last summer.
Maybe by 2017 I'll finally be able to go back to school.
I hope you're able to work with your psych and find a path forward, Tapejara. Let us know if there's anything we can do.
Just told my best friend I have depression. The more people I tell, the easier it is to tell people. It really wasn't all that difficult. It felt pretty good.
On another note, I'm on a little 5 day vacation (visiting said friend) and I'm having a really nice time.
Glad you're having a nice time, Kipp, and I'm glad you're finding it easier and easier to open up.
So I was late on my rent last month because I had to put in all my money into my credit card so I could rent a car for my roommate because his car was breaking down and he would lose his job if he missed another day.
His car is about to die, and he's leaving back to Florida at the beginning of February. Kept saying that he had no other option, meanwhile I've been trying to get a car while making a good three hundred dollars less than him a month. He tried to convince me to go back with him. Saying that me trying to stay in Colorado is just me not wanting my pride broken, and why do I care because I'm not prideful about anything else. He tried to back out of paying the month of February by giving the landlord two weeks notice, despite the lease saying a full month was required. Was hoping he would get pro-rated for the time not spent in there. She didn't take this, so I lucked out and only have to pay 350 this month since he still has to cover the other half.
But yeah, so he's getting ready for work today and asks me if I got paid, and if I'll pay the rent on time. I just said "yep" and walked away.
And you know since, the lack of a car, working hours that make it hard to walk to the grocery store that's a good forty minute walk, struggling with paying my rent while trying to get a car...food has actually been a real struggle with me.
"Going out two nights in a row, with (person) and her roommate. I'ma gonna hit that," said my roommate.
"I may get some cans of Corn that was left at the theater."
I'm sorry to hear you're having trouble with your living situation, BD. Are there any local resources you can reach out to for help with rent, food or car expenses? They exist in many urban areas to assist with folks who are in difficult situations like yours.
I'll admit, yesterday was a really bad time.
I came home to see a notice from the sheriff saying the lawyers have scheduled the foreclosure for Feb 29th.
So, we have until that long to find somewhere new to live and pack.
My wife luckily didn't freak out. I feel like a complete failure however, as its a direct result of my inability to find a full time job in these past 5 years. Despite all of this, I take comfort in the fact we made it this long postponing the inevitable.
To be honest, I'm looking forward to something new.. hopefully something we can afford. My mom said she would help with any security deposits we need which surprised me. My wife's dad owns some rental properties, with any luck he can cut us a deal on one (although he helped us out a lot when my wife's car died, he got her a new car and we haven't had to pay on it until I get a job -- so I'm hesistant to hold out our hand and ask for help there again)
On a similar note, her mom finally wised up and is getting a divorce (he's cheated on her repeatedly, like all of her other ex's).. so worst case scenario, I think we might be able to move into her spare bedroom until we find something (save up for a larger deposit or get a co-signer).. put most of our stuff in storage (fairly cheap solution for a month or two)
So, hopeful, yet I feel awful. Our phone was disconnected last night and I paid $200 to turn it back on (she ended up working from home today because of the snow). I'll be so glad when these days are over.
Thanks for letting me vent.
You're welcome to vent any time, Cth. I admire your strength in going through all of this. I don't know your relationship with your wife's parents but it sounds, to me, like an appropriate time to ask them to lend a hand with whatever housing resources they may have available, whether it be a room or a rental. I'm glad your mom is able to chip in, too. It's wonderful to have family that can help us through difficult times.
I got drunk for the first time since my depression really kicked in the other night. Not a good idea. It felt great for a while, but then it felt like shit. I remembered everywhere and with everyone I fucked up with in my life, and made me feel like fucking shit.
I guess drugs (weed) and alchol are no longer for me. When I get high (very rarely, less than once a month), I feel like shit. I usually end up in tears, and when I get drunk I end up feeling like even more like shit, even if I don't cry.
I really need to get better. I keep thinking that someone is gonna come in and help out here. If nothing else than to hold me and tell me everything is going to be ok. But they wont. Everything is up to me to get better, no matter what others think of me. The question comes down to whether I have the strength to grow, or whether I'm going to keep shrinking like I have been.
I really want to make me go out and help others who have been through the same or worse than me. It honestly makes me feel like shit that others have been through as much as me, or worse than me and I complain and bitch about it, but they remain so strong. I honestly don't know how they do it.
Stay strong MH GAF, tonight's going to suck, I know that much, at least for me. But you guys can stay strong and make it through this : )
First of all, I had similarly poor experiences with alcohol and weed that led me to conclude that, at this point in time, they're not for me anymore. I ended up in a pit of sadness or anxiety every time I used them and finally had to kick them for my own good. Is it ideal? No, we all wish we had escapes. But not having any go-to escapes like drinking
has really forced me to own up to the things I'd been trying to escape from, which was tremendously valuable. Not to mention I've saved SO much money.
I've found that others can be a huge support and a source of strength but that yes, ultimately the act of trudging forward rests with us and us alone, since we're the only residents inside this life and mind of ours. Nobody else can climb in and do tinkering. They can give us instructions on what to tinker with, or offer us resources to help with making changes, but we're the sole mechanic along for this ride. I don't think it's as simple as some people being strong and others not - we're all struggling with different issues in different situations. I think the things you wrote are important realizations to have, and I hope you're able to keep picking away at what's going on. That is progress.
What can I do to make myself feel less evil, microharmful and unemployable? This has largely been the "focus" of my CBT but I don't think we're making any progress.
I have a few questions, CM.
What do you mean by evil or microharmful?
What has your CBT consisted of? How long have you been at it?
<3
... why am I asking this here when I can text you? Lord, I'm lazy...)
