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Source: (consider it)
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Thread: chasing the Black Dog - a depression support thread
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simontoad
Ship's Amphibian
# 18096
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Posted
![[Votive]](graemlins/votive.gif) ((Ian))
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Human
Posts: 1571 | From: Romsey, Vic, AU | Registered: May 2014
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Bishops Finger
Shipmate
# 5430
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Posted
for all with Black Dogs, Slugs, or Hyenas...
Is it just me, or does the world go effing bonkers at This Time Of Year?
for all coping without that effing Holiday Cheer.....
IJ
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Our words are giants when they do us an injury, and dwarfs when they do us a service. (Wilkie Collins)
Posts: 10151 | From: Behind The Wheel Again! | Registered: Jan 2004
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Ian Climacus
Liturgical Slattern
# 944
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Posted
Definitely not just you BF.
for all.
Posts: 7800 | From: On the border | Registered: Jul 2001
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Bene Gesserit
Shipmate
# 14718
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Posted
For all here, at/re This Time Of Year
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Sancta Maria, Mater Dei, ora pro nobis peccatoribus
Posts: 405 | From: Flatlands of the East | Registered: Apr 2009
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Ian Climacus
Liturgical Slattern
# 944
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Posted
Happy New Year, all!
May 2018 bring strength, light and joy.
Posts: 7800 | From: On the border | Registered: Jul 2001
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Ian Climacus
Liturgical Slattern
# 944
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Posted
Not so much depression as anxiety...
For the first time I asked a colleague out for coffee...usually wait to be asked ["Who in their right mind would spend time with me?"] or go on my own. They said Yes. And a good time was had.
Small steps.
Posts: 7800 | From: On the border | Registered: Jul 2001
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Piglet
Islander
# 11803
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Posted
Small, but very positive, steps. Good on you! ![[Overused]](graemlins/notworthy.gif)
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I may not be on an island any more, but I'm still an islander.
alto n a soprano who can read music
Posts: 20272 | From: Fredericton, NB, on a rather larger piece of rock | Registered: Sep 2006
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simontoad
Ship's Amphibian
# 18096
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Posted
amen to small steps. I bloody hate [an image or symbol personifying anxiety]. It is a deadly enemy of mine. Oh the stories I could tell of my losing battles with anxiety, especially when I had no idea what was going on. Blind panic.
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Human
Posts: 1571 | From: Romsey, Vic, AU | Registered: May 2014
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Erroneous Monk
Shipmate
# 10858
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Posted
Belated happy new year to you all. I'm feeling OK, but thinking of those who aren't.
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And I shot a man in Tesco, just to watch him die.
Posts: 2950 | From: I cannot tell you, for you are not a friar | Registered: Jan 2006
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Bishops Finger
Shipmate
# 5430
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Posted
Amen to that.
My own Black Slug (I take other Shipmates' points about cuddly black dogs) is quiescent at the moment, rather like the Weather...
...but for all who find the Black One waking, crawling, and/or growling. Why does January always seem like two months, rather than one?
IJ
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Our words are giants when they do us an injury, and dwarfs when they do us a service. (Wilkie Collins)
Posts: 10151 | From: Behind The Wheel Again! | Registered: Jan 2004
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Piglet
Islander
# 11803
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Posted
I used to think that January felt so long because where I worked in Belfast we were usually paid on the last Thursday of the month, but as the whole place was closed for the week after Christmas, we were paid for December on Christmas Eve, making January at best a five-week month, and at worst a six-week one.
There was also the contrast with December, which was very busy with parties, carol-singing gigs and what-have-you, and all January seemed to offer was going to work and coming home again.
that everyone can keep their Black Dogs well under control.
[ 10. January 2018, 22:11: Message edited by: Piglet ]
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I may not be on an island any more, but I'm still an islander.
alto n a soprano who can read music
Posts: 20272 | From: Fredericton, NB, on a rather larger piece of rock | Registered: Sep 2006
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Erroneous Monk
Shipmate
# 10858
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Posted
I agree that the interval between pay days is one of the things that makes it feel long. Also I'm married to a tax practitioner, and 31 January is personal tax return deadline in the UK; so the Old Man is working very long days and I hardly see him. OK, so there are pros to that as well as cons.... ![[Biased]](wink.gif)
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And I shot a man in Tesco, just to watch him die.
Posts: 2950 | From: I cannot tell you, for you are not a friar | Registered: Jan 2006
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Piglet
Islander
# 11803
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Posted
Think of the "pros" - celebratory dinner* at the start of February?
* or whatever your preferred form of celebration
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I may not be on an island any more, but I'm still an islander.
alto n a soprano who can read music
Posts: 20272 | From: Fredericton, NB, on a rather larger piece of rock | Registered: Sep 2006
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Erroneous Monk
Shipmate
# 10858
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Posted
That is a good suggestion Piglet. ![[Smile]](smile.gif)
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And I shot a man in Tesco, just to watch him die.
Posts: 2950 | From: I cannot tell you, for you are not a friar | Registered: Jan 2006
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The5thMary
Shipmate
# 12953
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Posted
Hi, everybody. I think I posted something here once, about a thousand years ago. I'm having difficulties getting off a particular medication that I started taking when I was in a clinical depression research study about three years ago. It really sucks because I was taking this medication along with something else and things were pretty good. I had to stop participating in the study because my wife and I found a low-income apartment across the country and we needed to leave the East Coast (of the U.S.).
Anyway, I have spent the last few years trying unsuccessfully to get weaned off this anti-depressant but it's a Catch-22 sort of thing. A lower dose of the medication makes my anxiety and depression levels go through the roof and makes me have severe panic attacks and unrelenting depression. The full dose works...but it makes me physically sick and causes horrible insomnia. I wish I had never gotten on this medication!
Last night I had a horrible panic attack out in public, in a different city, sixty miles from where I live. Irrational thoughts kept popping into my head and I was sure that God considered me a worthless piece of shite. This anxiety lasted for about thirty minutes and the only thing that kept me from having a public meltdown was the thought that the stupid anti-depressant was in a large part to blame. I prayed and prayed, broke out in a cold sweat, prayed some more and finally, the anxiety faded back to whatever hellhole from which it slithered.
New Year's Resolution: Find a psychiatrist who accepts Medicare (government assistance) and get her/him to put me on another anti-depressant sooner than later. This awful medication is supposed to be weaned out of one's system over a period of several YEARS but I've tried that and I just can't do that again. ![[Frown]](frown.gif)
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God gave me my face but She let me pick my nose.
Posts: 3451 | From: Tacoma, WA USA | Registered: Aug 2007
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Bishops Finger
Shipmate
# 5430
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Posted
O dear.
Yes indeed - sometimes the bl**dy medication is worse than the illness!
Hope you get it sorted out soon.
More
IJ
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Our words are giants when they do us an injury, and dwarfs when they do us a service. (Wilkie Collins)
Posts: 10151 | From: Behind The Wheel Again! | Registered: Jan 2004
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Arethosemyfeet
Shipmate
# 17047
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Posted
I've been signed of sick for the second time in 10 weeks with what's listed as stress... but the symptoms are all anxiety. I've never had this sort of problem before. Or rather I probably have but didn't try to fix it and suffered for years in a previous job because of it. I'm taking medication that seems to do bugger all. I've had friends and family deal with anxiety and depression, but you never know what it's like until it happens to you. It's like my emotions and subconcious just decide to take my brain for a joyride leaving my rational mind tied to the back seat trying to convince it to stop before we crash into a tree. And it hurts.
Posts: 2933 | From: Hebrides | Registered: Apr 2012
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Piglet
Islander
# 11803
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Posted
{{{5th M. and Arethosemyfeet}}}
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I may not be on an island any more, but I'm still an islander.
alto n a soprano who can read music
Posts: 20272 | From: Fredericton, NB, on a rather larger piece of rock | Registered: Sep 2006
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Ian Climacus
Liturgical Slattern
# 944
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Posted
5th Mary
Arethosemyfeet
[ 14. January 2018, 20:34: Message edited by: Ian Climacus ]
Posts: 7800 | From: On the border | Registered: Jul 2001
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Golden Key
Shipmate
# 1468
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Posted
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Blessed Gator, pray for us!
--"Oh bat bladders, do you have to bring common sense into this?" (Dragon, "Jane & the Dragon")
--"Oh, Peace Train, save this country!" (Yusuf/Cat Stevens, "Peace Train")
Posts: 18601 | From: Chilling out in an undisclosed, sincere pumpkin patch. | Registered: Oct 2001
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Fredegund
Shipmate
# 17952
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Posted
Black Thing sitting under my desk at work. Very distracting - it doesn't seem to like tax.
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Pax et bonum
Posts: 117 | From: Shakespeare's County | Registered: Jan 2014
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Erroneous Monk
Shipmate
# 10858
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Posted
Hugs for The5thMary, Arethosemyfeet and Fredegund.
Anyone got any thoughts on how we can do parenting to lessen the extent to which our children might have similar problems themselves?
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And I shot a man in Tesco, just to watch him die.
Posts: 2950 | From: I cannot tell you, for you are not a friar | Registered: Jan 2006
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Arethosemyfeet
Shipmate
# 17047
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Posted
quote:
Originally posted by Erroneous Monk:
Anyone got any thoughts on how we can do parenting to lessen the extent to which our children might have similar problems themselves?
My parents have always been great. My issues are a result of the interface between my (unidentified until my late 20s) Aspergers' combined with a shitty experience of school. I suppose I can only say that if your kids are neurodiverse or otherwise different from the "norm" make sure you find out and help them to understand and find ways of adapting to what the world expects. Brushing off differences as unimportant isn't always helpful.
Posts: 2933 | From: Hebrides | Registered: Apr 2012
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Bishops Finger
Shipmate
# 5430
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Posted
Yes, neurodiversity is not in itself a Bad Thing, but it can be challenging.
I may have mentioned this before, but I was greatly cheered by a young lad of 8, whose family has recently joined the congregation at Our Place.
He said to me, with great delight, 'I have AUTISM!'. His mother explained that he had taken his neurodiversity on board, claimed it, and was PROUD of it.....
IJ
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Our words are giants when they do us an injury, and dwarfs when they do us a service. (Wilkie Collins)
Posts: 10151 | From: Behind The Wheel Again! | Registered: Jan 2004
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Arethosemyfeet
Shipmate
# 17047
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Posted
Excellent! I keep coming up against the issue that I want people I work for to be aware of my Aspergers' and how it affects my interactions with the world but I don't want it recorded as a disability because it's not - there's nothing wrong with my brain (in that regard) it's just the world is designed to fit a different type of brain. Mine does better at some things but not others.
Posts: 2933 | From: Hebrides | Registered: Apr 2012
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Ian Climacus
Liturgical Slattern
# 944
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Posted
for all.
quote:
Originally posted by Arethosemyfeet:
combined with a shitty experience of school
You too? I was only dwelling last night on the fact that if I had've been a "cooler" person or different school may've been different and people may've treated me nicely. Not a path I should've gone down. Made for a bad night.
On EM's post, I wish you parents all the best and my s. I struggle enough to be normal around my nieces at times.
Posts: 7800 | From: On the border | Registered: Jul 2001
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North East Quine
Curious beastie
# 13049
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Posted
Erroneous Monk, I have a relative with serious mental health issues (including inpatient treatment). She has always been open and honest, and has stressed that it is an illness just like chickenpox. Her children are doing just fine. She is my role model.
I know someone else who blames her children for stressing her and making her mental health problems worse. I think that that is taking its toll on the mental health of at least one of her children.
Mental health is something we talk about, not least because both my children have visited their relative when she has been an inpatient, and they both know that mental illness can happen to people who are kind, generous, and witty. I hope that knowledge will be a positive for them.
Posts: 6414 | From: North East Scotland | Registered: Oct 2007
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Erroneous Monk
Shipmate
# 10858
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Posted
Thanks for your responses to my query. I'm worried that my son (almost 12 years old) might be starting to show a tendency towards anxiety and my kind of overthinking. I always thought that some of my problems stemmed from how I was parented and I've tried to be different. Now I'm worried I'm getting it wrong.
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And I shot a man in Tesco, just to watch him die.
Posts: 2950 | From: I cannot tell you, for you are not a friar | Registered: Jan 2006
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Jengie jon
Semper Reformanda
# 273
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Posted
Erroneous Monk
I am not a parent and nor am I an expert on parenting. However I am from a family of chronic over thinkers. What I would say is quite a lot of the overthinking is genetic. You can not stop the kid over thinking, you can teach him how to handle it.
If you took a technique from mindfulness I would give it a name such as brain hamster . Then start referring to that both when you are overthinking things "Mummy's brain hamster has got on a wheel again" and when asking about if he is overthinking things. Sometimes recognising it is enough but if not then you can talk of ways to stop it running around the wheel e.g. ignoring it, distracting it, trying to persuade it to relax.
For me distraction is the easiest but then my brain hamster seems to think there is always a better wheel just around the corner.
Jengie
[ 16. January 2018, 18:18: Message edited by: Jengie jon ]
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"To violate a persons ability to distinguish fact from fantasy is the epistemological equivalent of rape." Noretta Koertge
Back to my blog
Posts: 20894 | From: city of steel, butterflies and rainbows | Registered: May 2001
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Arethosemyfeet
Shipmate
# 17047
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Posted
quote:
Originally posted by Ian Climacus:
]You too? I was only dwelling last night on the fact that if I had've been a "cooler" person or different school may've been different and people may've treated me nicely. Not a path I should've gone down. Made for a bad night.
I wasted far too much time and energy trying to be "cool" when there wasn't a cat in hell's chance of me being so and it wouldn't have made me happy even if I was. What troubles me is that in the pursuit of being "cool" I treated some people almost as badly as I was being treated. One I have apologised to and been forgiven, when I encountered them on Facebook 15 years or so later, but it took me a long time to come to realise quite how brutalising school can be. There are a lot of negatives traits in my personality that I can trace to trying and failing to protect myself at school.
Posts: 2933 | From: Hebrides | Registered: Apr 2012
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Huia
Shipmate
# 3473
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Posted
Jengie
That is brilliant - thanks
Huia
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Charity gives food from the table, Justice gives a place at the table.
Posts: 10382 | From: Te Wai Pounamu | Registered: Oct 2002
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simontoad
Ship's Amphibian
# 18096
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Posted
My brain hampster has escaped. It's hiding from my two little dogs under the couch. ![[Yipee]](graemlins/spin.gif)
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Human
Posts: 1571 | From: Romsey, Vic, AU | Registered: May 2014
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jacobsen
seeker
# 14998
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Posted
Would there be any mileage in hamster soup?
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But God, holding a candle, looks for all who wander, all who search. - Shifra Alon
Beauty fades, dumb is forever-Judge Judy
The man who made time, made plenty.
Posts: 8040 | From: Æbleskiver country | Registered: Aug 2009
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Ian Climacus
Liturgical Slattern
# 944
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Posted
quote:
Originally posted by Arethosemyfeet:
What troubles me is that in the pursuit of being "cool" I treated some people almost as badly as I was being treated. One I have apologised to and been forgiven, when I encountered them on Facebook 15 years or so later, but it took me a long time to come to realise quite how brutalising school can be. There are a lot of negatives traits in my personality that I can trace to trying and failing to protect myself at school.
Thank you so much for sharing.
I hit university and had no idea how to feel real friendships and let a lot of good and true friends slip away, or rather I pushed them away. An undiagnosed mental illness didn't help...how I didn't seek treatment I'll never know.
It pains me to this day. I've wondered about getting in touch and apologising, maybe even communicating about the undiagnosed-at-the-time mental illness, but didn't know how. Perhaps I need to join Facebook. Something to think about.
Thank you for sharing again.
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for all and their brain hamsters.
for all
Posts: 7800 | From: On the border | Registered: Jul 2001
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mark_in_manchester
not waving, but...
# 15978
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Posted
Talk of trying (and failing) to be 'cool' had me remembering my blind panic at an impending disco I could not avoid, and the very temporary relief felt in imagining that a book _must_ exist in the public library telling one what to do and how to move, at same. That's more than 30 years ago; I still shudder. Being young can suck. No wonder it takes a bit of getting over.
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"We are punished by our sins, not for them" - Elbert Hubbard
(so good, I wanted to see it after my posts and not only after those of shipmate JBohn from whom I stole it)
Posts: 1596 | Registered: Oct 2010
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Arethosemyfeet
Shipmate
# 17047
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Posted
I remember being forced to go to a disco. I took a bag of Lego and found a quiet corner.
Posts: 2933 | From: Hebrides | Registered: Apr 2012
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mark_in_manchester
not waving, but...
# 15978
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Posted
I think I was 15; Lego might have taken more guts than 'dancing', but I admire your style
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"We are punished by our sins, not for them" - Elbert Hubbard
(so good, I wanted to see it after my posts and not only after those of shipmate JBohn from whom I stole it)
Posts: 1596 | Registered: Oct 2010
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Nenya
Shipmate
# 16427
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Posted
Originally posted by Arethosemyfeet:
quote:
There are a lot of negatives traits in my personality that I can trace to trying and failing to protect myself at school.
I'm unpacking a lot about school with my counsellor at present, they are powerful memories and feelings. Experienced alongside feeling a tad disfunctional to be fifty-something and in tears to a relative stranger about things that happened when I was five...
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They told me I was delusional. I nearly fell off my unicorn.
Posts: 1289 | Registered: May 2011
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Golden Key
Shipmate
# 1468
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Posted
{{{{{Nenya}}}}}
In my experience, the work is worth it.
Good luck!
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Blessed Gator, pray for us!
--"Oh bat bladders, do you have to bring common sense into this?" (Dragon, "Jane & the Dragon")
--"Oh, Peace Train, save this country!" (Yusuf/Cat Stevens, "Peace Train")
Posts: 18601 | From: Chilling out in an undisclosed, sincere pumpkin patch. | Registered: Oct 2001
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Golden Key
Shipmate
# 1468
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Posted
{{{{{{{All of us}}}}}
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Blessed Gator, pray for us!
--"Oh bat bladders, do you have to bring common sense into this?" (Dragon, "Jane & the Dragon")
--"Oh, Peace Train, save this country!" (Yusuf/Cat Stevens, "Peace Train")
Posts: 18601 | From: Chilling out in an undisclosed, sincere pumpkin patch. | Registered: Oct 2001
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Nenya
Shipmate
# 16427
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Posted
Thank you, Gk.
And I meant, of course, dysfunctional... ![[Hot and Hormonal]](icon_redface.gif)
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They told me I was delusional. I nearly fell off my unicorn.
Posts: 1289 | Registered: May 2011
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Erroneous Monk
Shipmate
# 10858
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Posted
Joining in the hug. It's hard to see my son starting to experience similar things at school to my own experiences.
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And I shot a man in Tesco, just to watch him die.
Posts: 2950 | From: I cannot tell you, for you are not a friar | Registered: Jan 2006
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Huia
Shipmate
# 3473
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Posted
quote:
Originally posted by Golden Key:
{{{{{Nenya}}}}}
In my experience, the work is worth it.
Good luck!
Posting to second GK's comment.
This is the first year for decades that I have woken up on New Years morning feeling happy - not just "not depressed" but actually happy!
To be honest it feels weird.
Good though.
Huia
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Charity gives food from the table, Justice gives a place at the table.
Posts: 10382 | From: Te Wai Pounamu | Registered: Oct 2002
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Zoey
Broken idealist
# 11152
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Posted
Things I hate:
* Workplace politics and nonsense
* "Austerity" i.e. public services being screwed and front-line workers as a result having to be complicit in failing their service users and / or having to let their own mental-health take a battering (usually "and" rather than "or")
* My fucked-up brain
As you might gather, today I am mostly grumpy.
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Pay no mind, I'm doing fine, I'm breathing on my own.
Posts: 3095 | From: the penultimate stop? | Registered: Mar 2006
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Erroneous Monk
Shipmate
# 10858
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Posted
quote:
Originally posted by Zoey:
Things I hate:
* Workplace politics and nonsense
* "Austerity" i.e. public services being screwed and front-line workers as a result having to be complicit in failing their service users and / or having to let their own mental-health take a battering (usually "and" rather than "or")
* My fucked-up brain
As you might gather, today I am mostly grumpy.
I'm with you on all of those - well, in my case, it's my brain I hate, not yours....
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And I shot a man in Tesco, just to watch him die.
Posts: 2950 | From: I cannot tell you, for you are not a friar | Registered: Jan 2006
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Jemima the 9th
Shipmate
# 15106
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Posted
Absolutely with you both on the first 2. Austerity sucks.
Much love & prayers to all those in need (including your 5 year old self, Nenya).
EM - about the kids, I think, trite as it is, that awareness & doing one's best is very valuable. We got help for Kid A at age 12 - she was anxious, having panic attacks, self-harming, was withdrawn and angry. God it was grim. But we spotted the problem, got help, and she is now well, a couple of years down the line. I was very big on "This is an illness like any other, if you had a problem with your foot we'd go to the GP, your brain isn't very well so off we go..." There is so much stigma still. Acceptance, taking things seriously, and not freaking out (at least, not so that the young person can see ) is helpful.
It was only much later that I thought, "Oh! But of course, I am anxious, I have (probably) been depressed...." perhaps it was likely from a hereditary point of view.
And we are not our parents. Mine knew I wasn't right. They knew I'd had obsessions and odd ideas as a kid, they knew I was anxious. They found out about the SH in the end. And they did nothing to help. It was a reaction of shame and burying it under the carpet.
Posts: 801 | From: UK | Registered: Sep 2009
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North East Quine
Curious beastie
# 13049
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Posted
There is a high level of mental health issues on my mother's side of the family, and there is also a high level of stigma. I suspect a correlation.
When the North East Loon went to University he had to fill out a form to register with student health. He phoned my mother to ask if there were any family health problems "apart from our mental health issues"
Mum was outraged. "There are no mental health issues in our family!" she declared.
"What about X?" the Loon asked.
"X doesn't have mental health problems!"
"She's in a locked psychiatric ward!"
"Just because she's in a locked psychiatric ward doesn't mean she has mental health problems" said Mum.
![[Eek!]](eek.gif)
It goes without saying that under no circumstances would I tell my mother that I'm seeing a psychologist! But I'm being completely open with my own children; the family attitude I grew up with is not going to affect my precious children.
Posts: 6414 | From: North East Scotland | Registered: Oct 2007
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Erroneous Monk
Shipmate
# 10858
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Posted
Thanks for those thoughts. I've been in touch with my son's form tutor to say that I think that son is over-anxious about school and that this seems to be giving him quite a bleak outlook on life, and asking for any advice.
I'll see what comes from that and consider next steps.
I so recognise what you're saying about our parents' generation. My mum can't deal with the idea that there might be a hereditary component to my and my siblings' mental health issues. And she insists that my cousin's (her sister's daughter) psychotic episodes which have led to hospitalisation must be the result of someone spiking her drink!
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And I shot a man in Tesco, just to watch him die.
Posts: 2950 | From: I cannot tell you, for you are not a friar | Registered: Jan 2006
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