too much for people around me + any tips?

[tt_m]

The only support people I have in my life are my partner and my mum. I frequently have really bad panic attacks and usually I would call my partner to help me or go stay at their place, even at really late hours like 1-2am. I have been in this relationship for coming on 4 years now.

I have diagnosed depression and anxiety, ADHD and mild OCD and am taking prescribed mood stabilisers but sometimes it's just not enough. Recently, my partner has said that this pattern of behaviour from me which has been ongoing for the past few years is too much now, that I'm stressing them out and I can no longer go to them or call them when I am like this at weird hours of the night and I must deal with it in some other way. They said that they wish I was more like their friends. I know that my partner's emotions are totally valid and I should just accept it, I am feeling very rejected right now. These panic attacks are mostly because I just have so many feelings and I have no one to talk to them about. I don't feel comfortable talking with my friends about my erratic behaviour and thoughts and I only talk to them a couple times a month. My partner telling me this is also combined with the fact they are hanging out so much with their friends and are in stable friendships where they talk to people every night and go out with them regularly makes me feel so much worse since we have been seeing each other less and they told me calling was too stressful for them. Now I feel as if I'm the one who is initiating conversation, and asking how their day is and I don't get anything in return. I feel like a horrible burden and feel really bad that our relationship has hinged on me being annoying and putting them into a caregiver role when they are just trying to live a normal life. I don't know what to do at this point, I love them and want to have a beautiful relationship where we are happy. 

Whenever I try to talk to my mum, she just tells me I need to organise therapy for myself and that she is exhausted by being my caregiver. I function pretty normally in everyday life, so getting someone to care for me would be pretty useless. I am strapped for cash at the moment, and can't afford to see my regular psychologist weekly, and i am so discombobulated that i would find it really challenging to organise my own therapy and find motivation to go. I wish I had friends I could speak to regularly and I wish I had more people than my mum and my partner, who I am too much for. Everything is really overwhelming. 

I was wondering if anyone has any tips on making friends with the intention of talking about my feelings regularly and how to build a broader support network? Or being able to find accessible therapy and deal with the process of actually seeking it + admin (this kind of stuff, reaching out, emailing, etc. can feel really overwhelming). I really appreciate any responses. 

Thank you for reading, 

Tia.

[TrueSeeker]

Hello

I'm so sorry that you're going through this. Living with mental health issues is hard, I can understand how our mind can be a dark place sometimes. It can become hard on our loved ones too. As much as they are trying their best, it can be exhausting for them too and sometimes all they can do is to gently push for us to try some other techniques that might work better.

What usually happens to me is that I get upset then I get upset that I got upset get upset even more and this can keep escalating till I find something that breaks the cycle. It's definitely not easy to deal with it and the  further I let it go, the worse and harder it gets. To break the cycle I realised that I need to learn to relax my mind in the very early stages so it doesn't get worse. It's not always possible as sometime I wake up already very upset but the more experience I get with calming myself down the easier it gets.

I find focusing on the environment I'm in can calm me down. I look around my room and think how peaceful everything is, how warm my bed is, how good my blanket feels, how peacefully quiet it is outside and when cars come by how peacefully they just come and go. There is no harm anywhere, everything is peaceful, the fear is just in mind. During the day I go for walks or do some gentle physical activity that puts me in a relaxed mode so I can face the thoughts that are causing me distress and look for a proof outside of my mind that there is nothing to worry about. Journaling can help a lot with making sense out of our thoughts and align them with
reality.

I hope that this helped a little bit, please be nice to yourself, keep trying different things till you find what works for you, things can get better. And whenever you feel like it, you can always share your stories, thoughts and feelings here and that can help too