That uncontrolled crazy feeling

[Gingerninja]

Hi People out there in cyberspace,

I'm hoping that sharing this with you will help me come to terms with my psychological problems. It's hard to talk to people in person about the craziness in your head. The thing that sucks the most is I KNOW that I have nothing to be depressed /anxious about. You know, the standard first world problems type of disorder: I have a house, partner, am an engineer, fit, good family, friends, awesome dog.

I'm an almost 30yo f, who has just had a major depressive episode, where I did some pretty stupid things. I have struggled with depression and anxiety for 18 years with varying degrees of success. I'm successful in my job (apparently) however, just recently I noticed all those symptoms coming back, the self doubt, loathing, hatred, anger, frustration and crying. 

I didn't act on the symptoms 6-8 weeks ago and then they just progressively got worse.

I am currently working away, which is a pressure cooker environment, and in a nutshell, I had a few drinks, got into a massive argument with someone, ended up in tears and then ended up self harming because it seemed like a good thing to do at the time. So.... now I have had to take time off work, to pretty much try to sort out my head again. The embarrassment, shame, guilt and additional self loathing of being such a nut case is even more depressing and just frustrating. I'm so concerned that I have totally wrecked my career and I am dreading returning to work, because I know that I'm definitely a nutcase and how am I going to cope with having to show my face there again?

i want to know if anyone else ever gets tired of working on their mental health? Does it wear you down to the point where sometimes you just slip back into bad habits, because sometimes you are just too tired, or can't be bothered? 

I also want to know if anyone else here has violent fits of uncontrollable crying or urges to hit something? Sometimes I want to hurt myself so that I won't feel anything. 

How do I cope going back to work? And trying to repair the damage that I have done?

I'm starting to realise that this is a lifelong condition for me, and I'll always have to filter and work on my thinking. It's a scary thought.

So the other thing is I know I'm doing all the right things now, seen my GP and had my meds adjusted, got a new MHCP, booked in to see the psych.

What I hate most is that there are people out there, including people on here, who are suffering from far more tragic circumstances, wether it be relationships, hardship, bullying, family issues or health problems, and yet I sit here with no perceptible problems apart from self inflicted misery.

Ginger ninja.

[Imagine]

Hi Ginger Ninja,

I can't add much to the previous posts except to stress that you did NOT choose to feel this way. You don't feel so miserable because of your circumstances in life and would be suffering whether you had some external cause to blame or not. First world or Third world you would still be in pain and that is NOT your fault. Please be kind to yourself and don't add guilt to all your suffering. This disease is so insidious and cruel in that it not only steals all of your pleasure in life but also makes you feel guilty for the things IT does.

I know it's hard facing the people at work, but they are just that - people and many of them will face depression/mental illness or be close to someone who faces depression and will understand. Anyone else is in no position to judge and if a few people lack compassion, empathy and forgiveness, that is a failing in their character not yours. We are all human, we all make mistakes, errors of judgement and if we are good people, we apologise when we are wrong and get on with making things better as best we can.

My chronic illness is physical, but after 20 years of pain, fatigue, nasty treatments, seizures etc I do have a deep understanding of the feeling of being so tired of dealing with it all, of feeling like you cannot ever escape and seeing the endless pain stretching ahead of you. It is so hard to face another day. The 24/7 year in year out relentlessness wears you down. I don't know what the answer is except to keep going as best you can but with the knowledge that others can and do understand.

Please take care and keep in touch

Imagine x

[joey]

Hi Ginger,

I have come onto this post pretty late - I have been so tired lately I cant read all the posts and didn't read all of the replies so hopefully not repeating things!

I guess I just have some advice about returning to work after an 'incident' such as yours. I have had a similar thing happen in the past - at more than one workplace.

I guess what I found works is

1) acknowledge you have a problem and are seeing someone i.e. so about the other night, just so you know I am getting some help and I am doing ok now.

I think you need to do this for a few reasons - to be fair to people that might be worried, to acknowledge that it's an illness an you are getting treatment - this might help people to expect it wont happen again. Generally I found people were either worried or scared and either way didn't want to bring it up. I chose to speak to each person individually. I didn't make a big deal of it - jus that one sentence and then let them decide if they wanted to ask more.

2)otherwise just go on acting normally. If you are normal others will be too.

Anyway. Other bit of advice is don't beat yourself up about it. It happened. Sure it's not great but nothing you can do now so don't worry about it. Sometimes after something like this happened I would feel that I had to behave sadly afterwards to help people understand. I was very up and down and often suddenly felt better again but thought others might find this confusing. Anyway all that happened is I got very confused! And what was one bad day turned into a whole week.

Joey

[Gingerninja]

Thanks imagine, Joey & Neil 

some more great advice, will def take on board,

apart from that, I hope that Saturday brings a little bit more light to all of your days.

ginge

[Neil_1]

Hi Ginge-Ninje,

Damnit all ... I've forgotten to mention this earlier ... as it's now the weekend and it's possibly too late, but is there anyone from your work who you ever contact outside of work?   Like email or phone texting?  There's probably even newer technology available, but I wouldn't know of such things.

Anyway, the reason I ask, is that (oh, but you may have done this already) if you can do that, you can sort of get a feel for what the office environment will be like for you on Monday.  Just a thought.

And do you have a kind of plan in place for how you think you'll approach your day back?  Oh, but only share if you feel like it.

Kind regards

Neil

[Gingerninja]

Thanks for your concern Neil,

my biggest issue is that I have to fly to my work site on Monday arvo. We only have a small team, and I would rather not talk to most of the people out there... Due to circumstances, I'm feel like I can't trust anyone, so the people who I would have spoken to, I don't really feel comfortable speaking to.

anyway no plan ATM.... Just trying to forget about it for now.

ginge

[Neil_1]

Hey Ginge (I'm being cool now, like you, and dropping the 'surname part of your handle') - I even used the word, "handle" ... look at me go!

Ok, it's Monday evening as I write this ... you flew to your work site on Monday arve.

Have you met up with your work colleagues yet and if so, how did it go?

And more importantly, how are you doing?

Kind regards

Neil