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Timshel

Timshel
Community Member

Hello out there,

It’s 4am and once again I am really struggling to sleep which means I will now be wrecked tomorrow and will probably end up sleeping half the day away.

I have many problems in my life at the moment. Serious relationship issues in a 28 year marriage, parenting issues with my 15 year old son, a long history with anxiety, anxiety disorder and depression which has only been exasperated by the above mentioned family issues. I am not coping, just getting by (barely). I have no family out here in Oz and no close friends out here any more who I feel I can open up to. I have become increasingly isolated and alone and lonely even though I am in a ‘marriage of sorts’ and have a son. The in-laws aren’t close so I don’t see much of them. I have occasional professional help and have contacted Lifeline in types of great distress. But they can only talk for certain periods of time and I have to retell my story each time, a story which keeps evolving and changing all the time as more and more problems arise. I am so tired physically and emotionally and have been for so many years now. Mental Health issues are enough to cope with alone but all the family issues and lack of support on top of that have broken me completely. No relief in sight.......can anyone relate?

26 Replies 26

Timshel
Community Member

Hi SH,

My GP visit was good. He will take over the management of my meds from now on. Pretty straightforward. I don’t think I’ll be looking around for a new psychiatrist at this stage. If at any stage I need a specialist to talk to, I’ll just look at booking some sessions with a psychologist. To be honest, I’ve seen so many therapists over the years that I’m not sure what more they can do. But I’m always open to suggestions. Just someone to listen who understands can be helpful (like my psyche). Over time, I’ve sort of learnt to cope by myself a lot of the time. When things get rough I just grit my teeth and bear it. I’ve learnt from experience that, regardless of how bad or scary things get, you do survive and rough periods do pass. A lot of my OCD is mental and internalised. The best way I can describe it is to say that there is always a certain degree of white noise humming away in the back of my mind. It’s annoying and frustrating but not necessarily all consuming. If, however, I hit a rough patch, that noise becomes deafening. It stops me in my tracks and seems to consume my every waking minute. I guess you could say my brain feels a bit like a stereo that is always turned on. There is always noise in the background but the volume is turned down so it still allows me enough space to concentrate on doing or thinking about other things. Sometimes, however, it feels like someone has turned the volume up so high it takes up all the space in my brain so concentrating on anything else is impossible. And, no matter how I try, I just can’t find a way to turn the volume down. The control button has completely locked or seized up. OCD has actually been referred to at times as ‘brain lock’ which is exactly what a bad ‘episode’ feels like to me. Like my brain is just ‘stuck’, not unlike a heart in need of a pacemaker to shock it back into a normal rhythm. In fact, there is a surgical procedure available for OCD which is not dissimilar to having a pacemaker inserted in the brain. But it is risky and rare and only used in cases where patients have exhausted all other options and treatments over the years and have been proven to be completely treatment resistant. I, like a certain % of people with OCD, get a little relief from my medication and just have to do the rest of the work myself. Although, in years to come who knows. For now, I just try to manage it, keep the volume down low. Avoid obvious triggers like stress from, let’s say, a marriage breakdown........

SH-2600
Community Member

Hey there

Thank you so much for sharing your experience of OCD. You are on a rough path, Timshel. I wish that it was different for you, if only that bloody magic wand existed! I imagine it consumes a lot of energy to just keep it in the background, and I am sure not every one understands what that takes from you and how little it leaves you. It sounds like you know yourself really well though and already have all of the tools available to you to help manage. I think getting older teaches us a lot about what we can do and cope with and survive. I feel so much of your strength and stoicism in your last post. I think you are a bloody marvel! But at the same time I acknowledge that you may not always feel that.

I think I can relate to some degree. As a result of ptsd, I experience intrusive thoughts around self worth, although over the years the punishing words have evolved more into words, half words, sensations and feelings. The best way to describe it is that it feels like being psychological punched. When it is bad, I physically flinch at the feeling, and as it continues to come at me, I feel like I am being beaten down. It is my own voice just slicing through my self worth. I have learned to (mostly) identify it reasonably quickly and manage it, although most days I hear like an echo of it niggling away in the background. When it is bad, I don’t sleep and that makes it all worse and harder to manage. It becomes a self feeding cycle that gets out of control and is hard to circumvent.

Sometimes I feel like a human brain is such an incredibly beautiful and complex organ, capable of so much, but then it just does the equivalent of tripping over its own feet or pulling on the door that says “push”. The analogy of the heart pacemaker makes a lot of sense. Imagine the day when it is just a relatively simple procedure to reset our brain function!

What are some of the things that help you to keep it all in the background and the volume down low, aside from avoiding big life stresses like marriage breakdowns! Are you managing to keep on top of it through the problems in your marriage at the moment? By the way, I hope things went well in your counselling session yesterday, and you are still feeling positive about the direction things are going at home.

SH

SH-2600
Community Member

Hi Timshel

I am just checking in to see how you are going. Thought I would do it here in your thread. I am here if you feel like a chat. If not that is ok too.

Take care

SH

smallwolf
Community Champion
Community Champion

Hi. I hope you don't mind me visiting here. I read your story so far. It sounds like you are the making improvements.

I could also relate to your homework story except that is the my wife who helps with the homework - that is because I do not give the kids the answer they are looking for. I only drop hints.

How is the sleeping going?

Timshel
Community Member

Hi SH and Hi to you Tim, it’s lovely to have you here. Thanks for checking in.

Okay. So the counselling session was 2 hrs long this time, a real marathon! I might start by saying a man, a woman, an eccentric counsellor and a chihuahua puppy went into a room.......hmmm! Just like the last session, it was a little chaotic and disorganised but at least I didn’t need to pee this time so could concentrate a little more. Actually, to be honest, in spite of the fact that we always seem to take the scenic route to our destination, I do find the counselling sessions good and the counsellor does know what she is talking about. And she does talk, a lot! I think I may know more about her than she does about me! But that’s okay. Both my husband and I do get a chance to speak, both to her and each other and, if nothing else, it gives us a chance to air our ‘grievances’ in a neutral and non-combative environment. We also have homework to do which is really all to do with reconnecting with each other after a very long period of estrangement (in the last 5 years, we have had divorce papers drawn up twice - yep, the lawyers love us - and really haven’t been on the same page about anything for over a decade). The last time we had divorce papers drawn up was just before Covid struck. We were just stuck in a horrible cycle of arguing over everything and when we weren’t arguing we just didn’t talk at all. We just gave up trying to communicating in any sort of constructive way. We stonewalled each other completely and a lot of resentment built up, especially in me. I was so angry inside and it was really hurting me. I hated the person I was becoming, so bitter. I hated him more for ‘making me like that’. It was unbearable. There just aren’t enough characters to go into full detail about our problems in one post but suffice it to say we were at rock bottom. But now, just a few months later, and mainly because I made the conscious decision one night to just drop my guard and tell him I still had feelings for him in spite of everything I had said to the contrary, we are getting back on track. It sometimes only takes one person backing down to make a difference. And I’m stubborn and he’s pigheaded so that isn’t something that came easy to either of us. I am still also getting over him becoming close to someone else but it hurts less these days. He has made every effort to help with that too which I really appreciate. The first being taking responsibility which is HUGE for him.

Timshel
Community Member

In reply to your question SH, I’d have to say that, yes, all the extra stress affected my mental health in general. I became more depressed though not in the clinical way I was with post natal depression (I probably wouldn’t be here talking to you now if that were the case, that must definitely have been hormonally based). I was just so fed up within my marriage and angry because I felt I had enough on my plate trying to keep the OCD at least reasonably manageable. You’re right, the effort to keep the volume turned down does take a lot of energy as does just dealing with the noise in your head to begin with. Surprisingly I didn’t have a complete OCD meltdown, maybe I was too distracted by my anger and depression! Not sure that is a good antidote though. I felt increasingly isolated because I didn’t really feel I could talk openly to anyone here (except my Psyche). My closest friends from Canberra have moved interstate and back overseas and it just didn’t feel appropriate opening up to others. In many ways, I didn’t want to badmouth my husband because at the back of my mind I guess I always felt we would eventually work things out and I didn’t want anyone to think badly of him. So I chose to be very careful who I talked to. I eventually told my sister who lives in Dubai and was/is good to talk to although her life is extremely busy and the time difference between there and here is awkward. I am also pretty close to my sister-in-law (my husband’s brother’s wife) so I talked a bit to her. She lives down the South Coast. Apart from that and the occasional counsellor, I didn’t talk to anyone else in much depth. It was too awkward. After a while I even distanced myself from my close friends and family overseas, just stopped maintaining regular contact, even with my lifelong best friend who knew something was wrong and tried so hard to get me to open up. I felt I was just ‘small talking’ with them, hiding stuff from them and it was easier just not contacting them at all after a while which I feel really guilty about now. In time I will look at rebuilding those bridges. I guess I blamed my husband for the loss of those friendships too because I felt I was just sort of protecting his reputation. But, in reality, that was on me. It’s a tough one though. Then there were others who know us both and I didn’t want them to feel they had to choose sides as it were. Anyway, that isolation is what led me to this forum I guess. And that’s been my silver lining!!

Talk soon.

SH-2600
Community Member

Hi Timshel,

You describe your counsellor and the sessions with such humour! I am glad you feel it is useful and productive, and that you resisted the hot beverage! Although, 2 hours is a long session without coffee. It sounds like there is a lot of rebuilding going on now, even if there was a long way to come back from. My heart breaks at the impact it has all had on you and the damage it was doing. My hope is that the reconnecting also leads to repair, for the relationship and for you. It is so hard to pull yourself out of a cycle or pattern like that and it takes a lot to be the one who provides that circuit break. The more I learn about you, the more I see of your grit and strength. I really understand how hurt you must feel about your husband becoming close to someone else. I think that will take a lot to get beyond, but it sounds like you are starting . (I am also very conscious and embarrassed that I am the one doing that in my marriage, yet you still have the grace to listen and care). Sometimes it is really hard to talk about your primary relationship with other people, for those reasons you mentioned. You feel loyalty not just to the person, but to the relationship itself and the choices you have made. That is how I see it anyway. There are plenty of undercurrents and issues in my marriage that I haven’t spoken to friends about either. You said in a previous post that your husband was 100% there in terms of mending your marriage, but you weren’t yet. Do you feel that after this last session, you are a bit closer to 100% there, or that you will definitely get there?

I am so sorry you have become isolated from others in your life. It is like a perfect storm of illness, marriage problems and distance that all contributed. When the time is right though, those relationships will mend. You have everything you need to do that, and besides, good people always understand.

I really love how reflective and self-aware you are. I have a lot of admiration for you. Just take care to be kind to yourself too. I am happy to help by reminding you how amazing you are. There are definitely silver linings here for me too!

SH