I’m struggling with mental health but don’t have severe trauma

[Guest_66089868]

I’ve been diagnosed with ADHD, anxiety and depression, but I’m really struggling. I try to talk to peers about it but I most in similar situations have some huge trauma they went through in their life, but my childhood and everything was fairly normal. I don’t know why I’m struggling and it feels like I’m overreacting or doing it to myself. Maybe I am, idk. I just don’t understand why I feel the way I do as most seem to have some kind of clear trauma that lead them to feel the way they do, I don’t mean to sound self absorbed as I understand that trauma like they go through must be absolutely horrific and I sympathise a lot. But I feel like I’m drowning but I don’t know how to swim.

[therising]

The warmest of welcomes to you at a time in your life that has brought so much self questioning, along with a serious sense of wonder.

Like yourself, I used to wonder why I struggled along with others who experienced depression and anxiety, people who'd faced obvious trauma compared to myself who had faced no obvious trauma. I used to question and answer along the lines of 'Why, where there's no great challenge and struggle in my life, do I still suffer so much? It's because I'm weak compared to those who are so much stronger than me. They'd have to be strong, otherwise they wouldn't still be here, having experienced that kind of trauma'. It was a sense of wonder that continued to lead me to the wrong conclusion, that I was weak. I'm wondering whether the following may offer a different and perhaps relatable perspective...

Some people will feel only that which is traumatic, as well as the impact or side effects that come with such trauma/s. In other words, they'll feel what is extreme. Other's will feel trauma, side effects and some other things in life as well. Then there are those who will feel everything in general. You could call them 'feelers' or 'sensitives', those who are sensitive to everything they feel. That last lot don't have to experience any notable or obvious trauma for them to feel.

I imagine you can feel what people say to you at times, weather it's joyful or degrading and depressing. I also imagine you'd be able to feel your own inner dialogue. Perhaps you can feel the side effects of a lack of something. For example, there can be a great lot of skill involved when it comes to managing our nervous system, a system that allows us to feel what's stressful (even the slightest of stressors). I imagine you can feel a lack of a number of other things. A lack of people making a positive difference can definitely be felt. Can have such a lonely and depressing feel to it. Then there's the heightened ability to feel other people's emotion or energies in motion. It's like you could be relatively calm or kinda happy before walking into a room full of arrogant people or a room full of stressed out people. How does the arrogance feel? Suffocating, agitating or angering or maybe there's a sense of something else? How does other people's stress feel? Remember, it's not your stress, it's their stress. Can you feel their stress through your nervous system? Can it feel breathtaking? Does your breathing suddenly change when you walk in the room? Can you feel the speed at which you think or the volume of what you're feeling? Can you feel the smell of someone's perfume or aftershave? I won't go on because we'd be here all day. I should add that feeling so much can become exhausting. The problem with this can involve a depressing lack of energy (that comes from exhaustion) being...well... depressing. 

It's a strange but interesting concept, being 'a feeler' but it's a concept that can take us from saying 'I don't understand why I'm feeling the way I do' to 'I don't understand why I'm feeling in the ways I do'. In other words 'No one's ever shown me how to better understand and master my ability to feel pretty much everything'.