Mental Health.

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14 Jan 2014 18:59 #133283 by
Replied by on topic Mental Health.
Thank you for the links, steamboat - I especially like the 21 tips.
I, too, have multiple diagnosis and have since I was extremely young.
I remember my mom crying as they told her what was "wrong" with me and being told, "it isn't you it's your *insert diagnosis here*.".
I grew up thinking that way - until I met my husband now who has been a light and a rock for me. He sat me down one day and said things to me that no one had ever said before... in ways no one else could. He made me look at myself in a completely different way and lifted a weight from my shoulders I didn't even know I was carrying.
Does it still hurt? Like hell sometimes.
Do I understand it? No.
I also really hate talking about it, still.
So I normally just don't.
But sometimes it's nice to hear others talk about it.. to know you're not alone.
So, thank you for this thread and for those who have shared part of themselves that is so vulnerable and misunderstood.
I'm sending warm e-hugs to all of you :)

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14 Jan 2014 19:07 #133288 by Edan
Replied by Edan on topic Mental Health.
Kamizu, you've summed up really what I was going to say.

If you can't look at yourself in the mirror, or you obsess over food, or you want to sit in the dark all day and not talk to people, these are no less painful, but perhaps often people do not realise that these are symptoms because they are not physical.

I had depression at a time I was supporting someone else with depression and it was unbearable; for a long time I never even realised I had a problem. I told someone I thought I was depressed and they told me I was being stupid. Perhaps the problem is education; we know the symptoms of lung cancer, meningitis, even the flu but does everyone know the symptoms of depression, or bi polar disorder? Probably not.

It won't let me have a blank signature ...
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14 Jan 2014 20:23 - 14 Jan 2014 20:44 #133299 by Kit
Replied by Kit on topic Mental Health.

Wescli Wardest wrote: That is very touching Kamizu... and very informative. Thank you for sharing. :)

I have never been diagnosed with anything and (I don't know how to say it without sounding callous) I am always trying to "figure" it out and understand it. Mainly because it is a topic that does hold a significance to me for personal reasons.

If you don't mind, I'd like to ask a few questions and if you would answer them and they are too personal, PM would be cool too. ;)


I'm all for trying to explain it to someone trying to understand :D It's sometimes like trying to explain faith to someone who's never believed in anything outside themselves sometimes so most of what I have are stories haha. Ask away! There's little I won't talk about and lots I don't have the answers to but I can offer what I've got :D

Wescli Wardest wrote: Do you know what started it? Like... what was the reason?


For my anxiety, there's a few things. Nature AND experiences. Now, I'm sure there are lots of different kinds of anxieties but how it was explained to me is it's a "Fight or Flight" instinct.

When you have your web browser open, and you want to get to the forums here and a specific thread, you could do one of two things: Type in the web address to TotJO, click on the forum button, browse to the section your thread is in, find your thread, and there ya go! OR you could save that thread in your Favorites.

Fight or Flight is your brain making a favorite. There's a bear > Run! Instead of There's a bear>the bear is bigger than me>it's stronger and has lots of claws and teeth>I probably won't win a fight against this bear>I should run> RUN! The shortcut is good, right? Problem with anxiety is it makes 'Favorites' all over the place for silly things. Husband says: "Hey! Lets do this new thing!" and I go strait into "*fear* here's all my excuses why I can't do this" (Flight) and if he corners me I get angry and snap at him (Fight)

Why am I afraid of new things? It's a bit two-fold. My mother has high anxiety and is VERY prone to panic attacks. I 'learned' anxiety from her, as well as naturally having the issue myself. She basically didn't allow us to do anything growing up so it's hard for me to do it now. But what we found out in therapy went kind of like this:

I'm afraid to go to new places/do new things> because I feel like I'm wrong > because I'm worried about doing something wrong > because I don't like doing something wrong > because when I was young, I was teased. So I did everything I could to not stand out. When I do something different or wrong, I stand out and get teased for it.

And it took us three months to get there. Because all my brain does is New?> BE AFRAID!

As far as depression, I'm not entirely sure. That's something I was diagnosed with when I was in High School, and refused to believe in it (in myself) most days. I don't know if I DO have it, or if it's my results of getting stressed and breaking down from anxiety. But there are plenty of times where I was 'down in the dumps' for no reason. I just stayed quietly to myself in my little hole.

Wescli Wardest wrote: Does isolating yourself create a cycle that just worsens the condition? (that is just a theory)


In my experience it most certainly does. You're breaking several of the wellness pillars with it. Physical, mental, spiritual, social. Actually, come to think of it, you break all of them as you go. You're already mentally unwell, withdrawing leads to no social wellness, too tired to do any physical wellness, and in depression spiritual wellness is unimportant along with everything else. It always seems that EVERYTHING goes wrong at the time. I cling to little things to try and make me happy and it always seems that those fail and I'm left with nothing. And THEN I don't even have the energy to clean the house so it gets bad, then I get frustrated that it gets bad, then enter my ADHD which says "Ooo, that's setting you in anxiety? Look! Something shiny!" so the house doesn't get cleaned, so I get frustrated....wheeeee down the spiral we go!

Wescli Wardest wrote: And I guess a question to everyone else, how do you "know" you might have an issue?


I meant to touch on this in my first post. Most of the time you don't. I'm 29 years old and only just realizing things. I blamed me having a fear of going places on my mom. She actually had a much much much smaller impact on it than I thought. It took me chatting with a friend of mine I met while I was deployed last who has anxiety/OCD to point it out to me. I didn't think anything was WRONG with me necessarily. Only that I was a coward compared to 'most people'

I guess the big point is recognize when yourself or another may need help. It's not a weakness to seek help. I had to reconcile some of the creeds I've lived by. The Airman's creed, Middle line "My mission is to Fly, Fight, and Win." And the last two lines: "I will never falter/ and I will not fail." You know what? these are just pretty words. They only hold for so long before I break. When I break, do I fail? Did I falter? Did I lose? We feed these lines to our Airmen. They learn this going through Basic Training. This is what they are built around. What happens when they find what they were standing on no longer supports them? *shrug* Our current catch-phrase is "Resiliency!" What the ---- is that? Can I get it at Walmart? Two gallons please! One "Resiliency Day" we went out to watch a military movie. I hit panic attack. I don't watch modern military movies because I don't like how they make me feel. I told my boss that she could give me paperwork right now, because I wasn't going to the movie. Didn't care if it was ordered by the Commander. Wasn't going.

The other creed we all should recognize: "I shall never seek so much to be consoled as to console;". Initially I took it to mean that we should NEVER look for help. Only offer it. But perhaps it means more that I offer help more than I receive it.

Well this came out a little longer than I thought it would XD hopefully I answered some of your questions but I'm sure I generated more haha. Remember, this is all from my understanding, experiences, and point of view. If anyone has questions, I'm more than willing to try and answer them.
Last edit: 14 Jan 2014 20:44 by Kit.
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14 Jan 2014 20:36 #133301 by
Replied by on topic Mental Health.
Best description of anxiety disorder I have ever read, and I've read a few. Thank you.

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14 Jan 2014 20:51 #133304 by Kit
Replied by Kit on topic Mental Health.

tzb wrote: Best description of anxiety disorder I have ever read, and I've read a few. Thank you.


:D Thank you! I was trying to figure out how to explain it so it was understandable by everyone. I have this mental image of the brain being a bunch of wiring and anxiety being a bunch of shorts along the wires...but not everyone has an understanding of electricity XD
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14 Jan 2014 20:54 #133306 by steamboat28
Replied by steamboat28 on topic Mental Health.

Wescli Wardest wrote: And I guess a question to everyone else, how do you "know" you might have an issue?


For me, as a generally rational person, the recurring theme was having thoughts and feelings I couldn't explain. I don't mean just random things flitting into your head, all willy-nilly, but things that you should be able to explain. Like, when you're hating on yourself for absolutely no reason, or when you're worried you're going to screw something up when you know you've got it right. Or when you're sitting in the floor, seriously contemplating ending your life, and you suddenly realize "This isn't normal. There's not a chain of events that's led me to this decision. I'm just...doing things."

That was it for me. When I knew that I didn't make any sense sometimes, I knew I had a problem. When I couldn't deal with it on my own any longer, I knew I needed to seek external help.
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14 Jan 2014 21:03 #133310 by steamboat28
Replied by steamboat28 on topic Mental Health.
Sorry for the double-post, but a friend of a friend just pointed out this very brand-new and far too topical for my tastes post by Wil Wheaton: and i am nothing of a builder

It's times like this, when he's dead-on right about exactly how I feel that I just wanna put on my best Patrick Stewart voice and say the thing.

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14 Jan 2014 22:10 - 14 Jan 2014 23:02 #133314 by Brenna
Replied by Brenna on topic Mental Health.

steamboat28 wrote: If the ability to control our mood is solely within our mind, then obviously we're well and truly screwed up failures if we can't get hold of that. If the answer is so simple as to just "be happy," and we can't even do that right, what good are we?


No, the truth is that it is within your ability, but no one bothers to teach people how or give them the tools to do it. And the answer is not “simple”, but it is true. Its not your fault if you have no idea how.

*I am aware that I may not be particularly popular after this post, so I apologize in advance if I offend anyone. This is only my opinion based on my own experience and observations through study and work.

I was diagnosed with depression when I was quite young and suffered from it for almost 10 years. In that time I also had a serious eating disorder, self harmed and attempted suicide twice, and at the worst of it, for 2 full years I never left the house. Not once.

I also had very little effective support through my experience. The mental health system relies on throwing mood altering drugs at you and hoping the problem goes away enough so that you aren’t a burden on the system. After nearly 8 years I got to a point where I started asking “Why can my doctor not give me clearer answers? Why has this happened to me? What is actually wrong with me? So I started digging and educating myself. And what I found led me to start pursuing studies in psychology, counseling and the treatment of mental health issues, which form the basis of a private coaching group that I run in conjunction with 2 psychologists and a nutritionist.

Firstly. We do not know for certain what causes depression. The chemical imbalance hypothesis is currently the best working model available but does still not explain many of the issues around depression and anxiety. Even the people who write the most widely used diagnostics manual have admitted publically that the definitions and causes are vague. And despite startling and well supported research, the medical diagnosis for most mental disorders has not been updated since the early 90’s.

Secondly. The reason depression and anxiety are not treated as an illness is because they are not an illness. They are symptoms of an illness. Depression can be a related symptom of or caused by: Hormonal imbalance, trauma, stress, malnutrition, sleep deprivation, celiac disease, lupus, syphilis, toxoplasmosis, anemia, chronic fatigue, hypocortisolism, adrenal fatigue, hashimotos, hypothyroidism, pituitary tumors, hypoglycemia, concussions, long term smoking…and many other conditions. But very very few people diagnosed with depression are EVER offered additional tests to check for underlying issues.

Thirdly, antidepressants do not cure depression. They are not even designed to. In fact, to be allowed a patent to manufacture an anti depressant, the drug only has to be shown to be “marginally more effective that a placebo in 2 studies”. In addition, the studies where it is NOT more effective than a candy pill, do not have to be published or referenced (dontcha love science). They are meant to alleviate the worst of the symptoms and render the person “functional”.

The current model is an entirely physiologically based one. Ie, there’s something wrong with the body/and brain which causes the physical and psychological symptoms of mood disorders. But this paradigm has consistently shown itself to be flawed, leading to the question, could biochemical imbalances or aberrant blood flow patterns in the brain be additional symptoms rather than causes of depression?

I personally believe that in the majority of cases, this is accurate.

If depression was caused by a chemical imbalance that was uncontrollable, why does nutritional therapy, exercise, cognitive behavioral therapy, neuro- linguistic programming, meditation, acupuncture, yoga and personal spiritual practices show consistently both in studies and through antidotal evidence to be effective in the management and cure of depression? And why, during clinical studies, would placebos be almost as effective as drugs?

Thinking happy thoughts will NOT help you. BUT (and this is where the unhelpful but well meaning people always get it wrong) it is the watered down version of one solution. We do not teach people about the long term physical effects of the way our minds work. Nor do we teach people emotional and self management. None of which has anything to do with flouncing around like you’re in a positivity bubble riding on unicorns and just “getting over it”. What we do teach people is that they have a condition that’s “happened” to them which makes them broken. And in the process we victimize them and take away their ability to have control over the illness. We also never teach people to look past the symptoms to find the underlying issue, and fix it. If you had a broken leg you wouldn’t just take pain killers to manage the symptom of pain, you’d get your damn leg fixed! Depression is no different.

You can’t just “snap out of it” or “smile and cheer up” It’s not that simple, its damn hard work and its tough going. And it’s a twofold attack because you are not just body or brain. Find the physical issues and resolve them, find the underlying psychological issues and resolve them. It straightforward, but it’s not simple or easy. No one recovers from depression without working their asses off for it and being consistent in their approach, but it IS possible.




*climbs off soap box

Sorry for the rant. Im just so tired of seeing brilliant people debilitated by shittly used science and a medical community that encourages people to be helpless bystanders in their own lives.



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Part of the seduction of most religions is the idea that if you just say the right things and believe really hard, your salvation will be at hand.

With Jediism. No one is coming to save you. You have to get off your ass and do it yourself - Me
Last edit: 14 Jan 2014 23:02 by Brenna.
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14 Jan 2014 22:28 #133318 by Avalon
Replied by Avalon on topic Mental Health.
I just wanted to say thank you to everyone who's been willing to share their own experiences with mental health issues, be it depression or anxiety or what have you. I think it's safe to say that too often, these issues are lumped together, generalized, and even demonized, so for people to come out and say, in no uncertain terms, "Yes, I have this issue, this is how it affects me, and it's an on-going thing" is very eye-opening, and quite frankly inspiring.

So thank you again.

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14 Jan 2014 23:13 - 14 Jan 2014 23:22 #133328 by Kit
Replied by Kit on topic Mental Health.
If it makes you feel any better Brenna, my Mental Health doc didn't even MENTION medication to me. First: he gave me the tools to handle what I was experiencing (many of them were akin to meditation). THEN we spent a long time figuring out where it all came from. He never sent me to a physical appointment though. I don't know if I didn't warrant it or if it's not what they do.

It's not an easy fix. I've only seen the start of one panic attack since the doc said he felt I didn't need him anymore (I was of course welcome to come back anytime I wanted) but managed to stop the attack before it went into full-fledged panic...granted it took me a few hours to recognize what it was....

It's a long and difficult battle I'm fighting against myself...and I don't always win. And when I don't win I have two options: get angry at myself because I'm weak, or forgive myself for the momentary laps. And when I'm already beaten down, it's not easy to forgive. :(

So when I reach out to friends I typically end up with that attitude we were discussing lol.

But some people need more help than I do.
Last edit: 14 Jan 2014 23:22 by Kit.
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