Is it a mental illness or just depression?

[The_Abyss]

I am struggling. I have had periods of depression before, but this one has been long-lasting and all consuming. After a couple of episodes of self harm, and realising I had everything in place for accessing a successful suicide, I swallowed my pride and sought a referral to a psychologist. I felt more positive after the first visit, and felt I had the beginning of the tools to start climbing out of my abyss. At the second visit, many of my childhood traumas where cracked open, and like a Pandora's box, the poison has spilled forth, never to be re-constrained. Rather than making an appointment a week later, the psychologist made it at 3 weeks, and I felt like a victim of abuse all over again. He constantly refers to my inner voices of failure and hopelessness, which has the affect of making me feel more hopeless, more of a failure. Despite this, I have already developed a dependence - like a hostage dependent on the kidnapper, or a victim dependent on the abuser. Today he introduced Schema therapy, but I was unable to focus on that enough to get benefit. He is again unavailable for the next 5 weeks, and I feel like I'm drowning with no one to turn to. My husband doesn't know I've been attending the psychologist, and it's not a conversation I feel I can have. To make it worse, I have started getting menopause symptoms combined with dreadful PMS symptoms at the same time. I dread the next one as I swing between suicidal and homicidal during that week. I don't feel I can speak with my GP as he is also a work colleague, and living in a small town, I know or am known by people at each practice. In the meantime, I have started to get serious concerns that this isn't just a simple depression, but the manifestation of a borderline personality disorder, and that terrifies me. I don't know where to turn or what to do. Do I try a different psychologist and have to start all over again, risking ripping open the Pandora's box further? Or do I bide my time, work on the Schema therapy exercises the psychologist introduced me to and wait for him to have time for me? Do I do nothing, drowning deeper and deeper? What if it is a mental disorder rather than just a depression? GP suggested medication, but I'm not ready to admit I have a problem to that degree. Like an alcoholic that attends their first AA meeting, but isn't yet prepared to tell anyone they are going, or admit they have a problem. I'm sorry to ramble - I feel so lost and alone, drowning, terrified. In the Abyss.

[annie45]

Hi TA

good to hear your voice again. Late last year you posted on my thread encouraging me to try AD's. while it took me some time to come around, i did and they have definitely helped. So thank you for your words.

Im sorry to hear that you feel like your slipping backwards. It takes a lot of energy to keep our heads above water. Sometimes i think it would be easier to just succumb and let it wash over me again, but then I remember the lowest of the lows and know that I don't want to go back.

I also know the more I actively try to fight it, and out think it the more it consumes me. I know what i need to do to keep swimming and so I try to do these things. But if im tired, or i run out of hours in the day im getting better and letting it go and trying again tomorrow.

take care of yourself

Annie

[Croix]

Dear TA~

Ramble away - That's fine. I think I rather agree with Mary, you do tend to see things in absolutes, and I suspect have a flat out way of dealing with everything. In both cases maybe not as much middle ground as might be.

I simply do not think that going into hospital is a defeat, if it happens it is simply a necessary period to recharge. As time goes on I'm sure it will be needed less often. Mind you it might help if you were a little kinder on yourself. You know assignments are a major worry for you, what do you think might be a sensible course?

I don't know if the good outweighs the bad navigating waterfalls - what do you think? Exercise plus sport can be excellent, however generating panic attacks simply puts you back.

I'm too focused very often, and this narrowing of my thoughts and expectations does me no good, I need to see a broader picture where I'm reminded there is more than just the things I think are going wrong, and I have more abilities than I credit myself with. My partner helps me see this.

I get the feeling at times you are too focused too.

[The_Abyss]

No matter how fast I run, how far I roam, I can never outrun the darkness that hides within.

I'm not back for comment, and I guess not even really for support. I find myself alone and drowning yet again, isolation and expectation closing in. I just need a safe place to hide out for a moment, to take a break from being brave, take a breather from trying to stay one step ahead of the darkness.

Failure keeps knocking me down. I stand again, and am knocked again to the ground. Eventually I lay on the ground defeated, no longer brave enough to stand up only to be knocked down again.

I know part of my abyss this time is medication related - I have had a medication change to curtail one problem, which has stirred up the other. Anxiety and depression are clouding my judgement, stealing my energy. I know this, but it does not help fight the battle. I am a small boat, adrift on the raging ocean. Helpless in the face of the storm.

Pressure and expectation mounting, support system absent, struggling against the tide. Exams this week as well, and I find myself overwhelmed and unable to concentrate, unable to absorb the facts required. So close to the end, and yet afraid that I may fail again. A paralysing fear, so intense that I am unable to battle against it. So here I lay in defeat. If I do not try, if I quit before I fail, is that not better than the conformation of the failure itself? I have already failed it before, quitting rather than trying, but this is my final opportunity.

I put my life on hold to do the assignments, had nothing left in the tank, but failed those as well. So, instead of leaving me with a cushion of success, my exams now need to make up the deficient marks. Too much expectation. Too much pressure. Too much darkness threatening to engulf me.

Needing to hide, needing to escape, needing.

[Croix]

Dear TA~

It's been nearly a couple of years since you came here and as you know I've followed your progress all that time. Yes it is progress, and no you are not really defeated even if it seems that way.

You do not have to reply to this post, it does not say anything particularly profound anyway, just that there are people here that care for you, think you are very worthwhile and admire how you cope with all that life throws at you.

Those feelings are not based on achievements like exam results, but on what is inside you. Anyway I very strongly suspect that even if you quit this particular situation before all that long you will have turned around and be trying the hard things in life again.

When I feel besieged on all sides I know it is time I changed my outlook and perspective, and to do so indirectly with mundane but enjoyable things like a walk with Foxy Dog, a book I've read before and ...

Croix

[CMF]

Dear TA,

So sorry you're feeling this way. Please let us support you.

Cmf x