Emotional Support/Advice Thread

[charliesackett]

I just recently went through a wave of major depression. Like, last week I almost jumped in front of a train. I've been dealing with this sort of thing most of my life. I was about 8 when I started having suicidal thoughts.

They say have a support system and talk to people, but fuck that. People are capricious and it's not guaranteed you have good people in your life. Don't let flaky people be the reason you live or die.

Here's what I find works to manage it for yourself when you don't have friends or a reliable support system:

• realize it's temporary and treat it like a cold. It's a brain cold and it's painful and it sucks, but it's a cold. You'll get better eventually, but you have to take care of yourself and be gentle.

-set goals and accomplish them. Even if the goal is to throw out the pile of tissues on your bedside table, that's a thing you accomplished. Your brain will want to diminish the accomplishment, dont let it.

-give the depressed voice in your head a stupid name. Mine is Gunther. Remind yourself whenever it talks that it's just Gunther, and Gunther is an asshole. Don't listen to Gunther, he is not you and he is not a reliable source of information.

-focus on something else for a bit. Depression can be a lot like narcissism, but in a shitty hurtful way. Just stop focusing on yourself for a while to break the cycle. Video games help some people. Others like to focus on others. Maybe volunteer or something. Watch cat videos. Just literally anything that lets you focus on something external and stop thinking about yourself.

-eat right and exercise. Gut health is directly linked to depression so eating McDonalds will only make it worse. Exercise is just good for you anyway but it also gives you something else to focus on and releases endorphins. And then if you're a healthy awesome person it helps with self esteem and confidence and helps pretty much everything. It doesn't have to be crossfit or something ridiculous, literally just go walk around for a bit.

[minerrale]

Thank you. It actually helped. Seeing things from a different perspective always help.
And you're right: it was her choice, and the pain she was in made it the best choice for her at the time. I don't blame her for taking her life, I understand it. I just have some issues with a sort of "survivor's guilt", I think.
And you are also right that I can't save everyone, or every rat (by the way she's almost healed from her PTSD and depression, this little angel is back on her paws and happy, which does make it worth it in my mind). But I can try to help those who cross my path, and I think I'll keep to that.
No White Knight, no messiah, just a friend.
Thank you again, for speaking your mind and sharing your experience with me. I feel slightly better now

[SuperRazz]

Hello Everyone, I've read some your of comments and I'm sorry that you're all going through this. If it helps, I'd like to share a few thoughts.

I experienced the symptoms of anxiety and depression since I was kid. I've had for approximately 13 years. I decided to go through therapy after a nervous breakdown and a suicide attempt. I went through therapy for 3 years , although I was told the average person only goes through it for only 6-9 months. It was hard, but I got through it. I'm at the point where I can finally do the things I used to love, I can see myself having a future, and I no longer want to die. Sometimes I have my bad days, but they're a lot manageable than before. Your journey will likely be different, maybe a lot harder than mine. But depression can be managed and even, beaten.

here are a few things I learned after 'beating' depression (but I might get it again in future, Who knows.):

• manage your resources. If it's only Tuesday and you're already mentally drained, you'll be totally exhausted by sunday. Don't wait when you're wrecked until you take a break. Do the things that'll help you replenish these resources (may it be not coming to class or talking to a friend) AND don't beat up yourself for doing it.

• cut off those toxic friends out of your life, they could make your condition worse. If cutting them off will help you heal better, then it's worth doing.

• quit/ take a break from school or hobbies if necessary. In my case, I didn't do comics for 4 years.

• find a purpose every time one of those waves come. It doesn't have to be a big one. back then I used to think "I can't kill myself, who will feed my cat if I die?" or "who will water my plants ? who will my friend sit with at lunch when I'm gone tomorrow?". silly, I know, but it helped me.

• I realized that if I wanted to heal, I had to change my behavior. I was a perfectionist, a cynic, and an over thinker. Those traits worsened my mental illness so I worked on each flaw one by one.

• you are not your illness. I kept reminding myself that all the bad things I believed about myself are symptoms of an illness, rather than a reflection of the truth.

• not all therapists are the same. If they don't seem to be good at what they are doing (i.e. They talk more about themselves more than they listen to you), then find a new one.

• and lastly, although you feel worthless right now, the fact that you were able to get out of bed is an achievement. Celebrate every small task done. You showered? Congratulations! that's not an easy feat for someone who is depressed.

[SuperRazz]

give the depressed voice in your head a stupid name. Mine is Gunther. Remind yourself whenever it talks that it's just Gunther, and Gunther is an asshole. Don't listen to Gunther, he is not you and he is not a reliable source of information.

I second this. I personified depression into an abusive friend that comes and goes when he pleases. It helps in distancing one's self from the illness. It frames the intrusive thoughts as a separate entity from yourself, rather than thinking of those thoughts as your accurate judgement of your worth. "It's gunther! not me."

[unknown_user]

In my opinion, it's better to not deny your depressive thoughts or pretend that they are not yours, but analyze them critically - as it's described in "Mind over mood" and other books about Cognitive Behavior Therapy. Applying critical thinking to depressive thoughts is more reliable way to get through them than just close your eyes on them.
It's not an easy skill, but if you'll accustom to analyze your thoughts critically even when your emotions seems stronger than you and skew your worldview, then you'll manage to get over them more effectively. As I said, the particular ways, how to acquire a habit to critically analyze bad thoughts, are known as a methods of Cognitive Behavior Therapy. And I recommend to try to learn them to everyone, who have a problems with depression, if you didn't do it yet.

[SuperRazz]

it's better to not deny your depressive thoughts or pretend that they are not yours

Yes, I agree.repression is not an effective coping mechanism. Let me clarify. Sometimes intrusive thoughts come as " you cannot accomplish the task at hand at the moment, therefore you're incompetent and incapable". These are irrational thoughts because they are symptoms that come with the illness, and not an accurate value judgement of the self, like a toxic bully whispering in your ear (which is what I meant by thoughts 'not being yours', I admit I may have worded that wrong).

Applying critical thinking to depressive thoughts is more reliable way to get through them than just close your eyes on them.It's not an easy skill

definitely. How can someone rationally compartmentalize in such a state of mind? It's hard, but definitely doable.

how to acquire a habit to critically analyze bad thoughts, are known as a methods of Cognitive Behavior Therapy. And I recommend to try to learn them to everyone, who have a problems with depression, if you didn't do it yet.

I did ok applying CBT methods to myself. But to learn them to those who have depression? I tried and I will continue to do so but according to experience, I might not be skilled enough to effectively teach someone. I can only talk about them as methods that I recommend

[vfinnigan]

I'm scared of my next door neighbor. He's an alcoholic and an angry, scary drunk who lives with his mother, and not too long ago got stinking drunk and drove his truck into an irrigation canal. Over the past year, he's harassed us, saying our dogs barking is "disturbing the peace," while he's up all night screaming at his mother. He has threatened our dogs, harassed my son, and just the other day stood in front of our garage and wouldn't let my husband leave for work without harassing him even further about our dogs.

[unknown_user]

Do you have an occasion to tell the police about him or scare him away in any way? Such a people are usually pretty cowardly inside their souls.

[vfinnigan]

I've started a paper trail, as we put it. I'm unsure a restraining order will do much good because he lives too close to us. It would be difficult for him to comply with the order if he were so inclined. And it wouldn't be difficult for him to figure out who issued said restraining order and then retaliate against us.

We've been advised to just plain call the police if he detains, harasses, or threatens us again.

[unknown_user]

It's hard (up to impossible) to hide that I have some problems from depression spectrum from anyone I'm communicating with long enough. But I really don't want to discuss some specific details, like what meds I'm taking, exact diagnosis and another details of this sort.
Today's evening I've come to the massage session in hope to have some rest after the work week. At that point I already was jumpy because of missing taking my pills at morning, tiredness and hardness of finding the way to the facility. Because of last issue I was already late and additionally upset, when I had finally came. And when the massagist gave me the (standard?) survey list, where there were a questions, like: "do you have a health problems" and "what meds are you taking", I started to involuntarily cry, making the whole situation even worse (Ugh, I hate myself in such a moments; it probably looks pathetic, but it's really involuntarily ).

The problem is:
1. I didn't expect that I'll be asked such an inconvenient questions, so I was caught off guard.
2. I don't want to specify what exactly pills I'm taking.
So eventually I refused to fill the form and went away completely broken and depressed and then dealt with it in more typical way, like -

---

All these healthcare things are controlled by my organization, and they have an access to data I'm filling in ito the survey. So... For anyone who knows: will I risk to loose my job or will I have a problem with law or with anything, if I will hide some info about my health (actually saying, lie?) in such a survey? In my own country nobody usually gives a shit, but I really dunno about the UK.
Or maybe I'm just paranoidal...

[vothnthorvaldson]

The only case I see where it would be a problem is that if it's for the insurance, and still, you most likely will only get in trouble if you conceal a disease and then ask for outrageous reimbursements for medications for said disease.

Not saying medications names... well a lot of people can't even remember what they are taking... unless again it's suuuuper expensive and the survey is for insurance.. I don't see the problem.

[unknown_user]

I'm a weird person. If a random person trolls and insults me roughly with angry third-tier swearing, I usually just laugh... and, sometimes, answer with four-tier swearing. But sometimes simple, not-malicious phrase or question hurts and depresses me a lot...
Like, this question about the meds.
And also now I recall one case, when I went to the pharmacy shop, asked for meds and showed the receipt to the pharmacists. And it turned out, that one pharmacist was an intern, and the second one taugh her, how to handle realization of regulated meds. And the second pharmacist taught the first one, pointing on my receipt: "Pay attention, when you are writing a record of the selling of meds at this receipt! You should write this record and make a stamp as compactly, as you can. Because this receipt is for chronically ill patien, so there will be much more records, written in this receipt in the future, and you should leave a space for them". And the phrase "there will be much more records" surprisingly stung me... it's so depressing to understand that there will be much more records about selling the pills... for months, years... uggggh.
And also that case, when my therapist said "when I've seen you the previous time, you was almost happy. I mean, happy to that degree as the person of your worldview can be happy at all". "Happy to that degree as the person of my worldview can be happy at all"... it is not much. It means just not to be very unhappy. So every time, when I recall this phrase, it makes me sad.
And all these accidental phrases, beginning with "in such a serious case, as yours"... ewww

[minerrale]

For the survey: don't worry about it. I never talk about mental illnesses in these things because that's not what they're looking for. If it's a massage thing, they need to know if you have muscle or bone issues, like a scoliosis or something. They don't expect to hear about mental illness at all! As for medication, as @vothnthorvaldson said, nobody remembers the name of their pills XD

Urgh these so called medical professionals can be so horrible sometimes! Of course you're gonna feel like crap after hearing these kinds of stuff! What in the name of food is wrong with these people, seriously...

[unknown_user]

Urgh these so called medical professionals can be so horrible sometimes! Of course you're gonna feel like crap after hearing these kinds of stuff! What in the name of food is wrong with these people, seriously...

I think it's just too hard to think about of feelings of every patient, when you should deal with dozens of them every day. So, despite pharmacists and medical workers sometimes make me upset, I don't really condemn them for it, if I see that it's done accidentally, without bad intentions against me personally. But, of course, if they insult patients directly - calling them bad words - then I more than condemn.

[minerrale]

If they hurt my feelings, while I'm suffering from mental illnesses, then they're not good doctors and I tell them so XD
I have come to not tolerate violence or abuse, and even though I understand that they can't be mindful of everyone, they still should emember that we, patients, are human beings.

[unknown_user]

If they hurt my feelings, while I'm suffering from mental illnesses, then they're not good doctors and I tell them so XD

This is a valid point. Good doctor - especially psychiatrist or psychotherapist! - should be mindful about the feelings of their patients.
I'm just saying, that it is hard for them to implement this ideal in reality, when they have so much patients and probably feel a lot of stress themselves. And it also may be especially hard to not upset patients with such a mental conditions, which makes everything painful for them. So I'm personally trying to not be mad on doctors, who made me upset clearly non-intentionally.
In the same time, I can tell them, that this and that from their speech made me feel bad, for this and that reason, to clarify the situation and avoid the repeating of it in the future. And I think that it's useful to discuss it, not to bottle up.

[unknown_user]

Supposed hobbies that taken too seriously in a wrong way.

Oh. It's so relatable to me. If I'm saying that I'm drawing comics in real life discussion (despite I rarely talk about it IRL), people's first reaction usually is "cool!". But when they find out that it's a long full-colour diligently (but very unproffessionally, to say the least) drawn saga with black humor and satire and a lot of technical explanations of imaginary technologies, and learn that I'm devoting a huge amount of my free time to it and that by my estimations, I'll draw it for a next 5 years, it causes them confusion.
They are especially confused by my strong reaction on not-constructive unsolicited criticism (my reaction on unsolicited criticism is very different to my reaction on asked criticism). They don't understand, why I put so much effort in such a weird thing at why do I take it so seriously and get offended so easily, if they say anything unpleasant about it.

Nobody even wants to tell me what's wrong with it, except for the grammar and it's not helping (especially when I asked to focus on the storytelling aspect).

As far as I remember, I told what's wrong in my opinion at some points?
If you've lost these comments for any reason, don't worry - I'll try to find them or write it down again.

A story or any form of art is worthless without an audience, right? I start to tie how worthy my art in people's eyes, my mind told me so. My mind told me the quality of my works reflects myself, if it's bad so I am as a person. It's natural for human to judge others by what they can provide, isn't it the point of society? I know it's not entirely right, but I can't find counter-argument that satisfy me.

Try to look at it from the side. If someone draw or write even very not-professionally and clumsy, do you think that they are bad or not-worthy person? Probably not.

I can't look at Tapas frontpage or announcement of some popular artist interview without disgust.

Oh. I can relate to this point in some degree. But in my case, it's not a disgust, more like irritation. Besides, its mostly caused by those main-page-comics, which I don't like (i.e. if I think that it's not original and/or mawkish). If I like particular main-page comics, I can feel a bit envy, but will not experience much negative emotions in general.

(Yeah it's really bad, you might have even more lost the non-existent respect for me).

I don't think that people around disrespect you. We all have concerns about our creative works and ourselves, so it's all understandable. ✿ڿڰۣ—

[ar-ninetysix]

My stress and anxiety are at a peak high right now lol living in California, you always hear about it, there's gonna be a 'big one' bc we've apparently been having some earthquake drought, and July 4th hits us with a 6.4 earthquake, and we thought that was bad, but no lol why would it be?? We get a second earthquake yesterday, 6.9 or a 7.1, and now there's a government-issued State of Emergency in San Bernardino because, get this, the one we got yesterday was the real one. Yeah, the 6.4 from July 4th was a foreshock! A warning basically! A- And we're supposed to expect a bigger one as an aftershock?? And this aftershock sequence can last days, weeks, months, or even years??? bruh

I've been on edge this whole day so far, just constantly feeling the world swaying back and forth beneath me just little by little, and I can't tell if that's an aftershock or if it's just my mind being scared as hell. And like, I can play it off with loads of sarcasm, like "haha we're all gonna die dudes" but saying jokes like that also hit too close to home for me xD like I'm laughing it off, but I also kinda genuinely feel that way!

I- I dunno what to do, thanks for coming to my Ted Talk, I'll be here for the remainder of my life which could range from like 3 minutes to 9 years bc of the wobbly ground

[DiegoPalacios]

As someone who lives in Chile, a seismic country, i kinda know what it feels. Hope the Architecture in California has a quake proof design. (in Chile is a common practice)

I was lucky not to be in the big 2010 quake of Chile (8,8), but all the stories my family told were shocking.

but i can tell you this, if you and your loved onesknow the protocols on what to do in a quake, you will probably be fine.

[ar-ninetysix]

I didn't reply to this and um.. oops lol I initially just meant to post it as a .. screaming into the void thing. My posting it gave me this weird reassurance like "yes, I got everything out there, look there's proof of it right there" lol

Anyways, yeah, for the most part, a lot of the architecture is built for earthquakes, but like.. you never know. The apartments I live in have this huge backyard type of area, no wires or cables above it, and the apartment I live in is right next to that, so.. We'd be safe enough there. My parents stuff packed already, which like.. I wish I'd known about that xD

I was definitely more on edge about it a few days ago, just like the adrenaline or whatever kinda stuck around lol I've been feeling these "phantom quakes" which is basically earthquake PTSD and my body's feeling stuff that's not there. So, uh.. yeah, I panicked lol