Help :(

[Emelie]

I have suffered from depression since the age of 12, and anxiety for as long as I can remember. I'm 18 now. I have always had trouble having confidence in myself. There are things that I have wanted to pursue and participate in, but I am constantly in fear of other people. At university, I struggle to even participate generally in class as I begin to shake and redden and my heart feels like it's going to explode out of my chest. I believe that my lacking confidence and self-esteem stemmed from my mum's treatment of me from early childhood. She was always very verbally hurtful, saying things such as "I've had enough of you for today, I don't want to speak to you anymore or hear about your day" or "Go away" or "You are useless". She was also always very angry. My younger brother has Autism and so I struggled to get the attention that I needed. I felt I was always competing. If he did anything wrong, I was always to blame. I really want to get rid of these negative thoughts about my own self-worth. I was recently feeling a little better, finally acknowledging that I'm not worthless as a person. However, these thoughts have come back and they are as pervasive on my life as ever. My parents finally divorced when I was about 12 years old. My brother was 9. Both of my parents involved us significantly, as if they were trying to win our love and make us hate the other parent. That was very hard for me and my brother. It was a very very messy court process, and my parents were very hostile towards each other. Experiencing this and also experiencing the death of my friend in 2009, and another one of my friends in 2011 has really impacted on me. I also had some very toxic friendships until the end of school when I graduated with hardly any genuine friends. I abandoned them for fear of becoming so depressed that I would seek to end my life. 
Despite the fact that I now have a group of friends, a lovely long-term boyfriend and my family situation is not anywhere near as terrible, I continue to feel empty. It's not that I necessarily want to take the steps to end my own life. It's more of an apathy towards life and death. I wouldn't mind if I was dying. I feel without purpose, lost, stuck. I am not enjoying life. I don't get anything out of my day. I feel so bad. I don't know what to do about these feelings. I want to get better, but I just don't know how. I've seen many professionals, but I feel I can never overcome this. I don't know what to do. 😞 Please help.
-E

[Neil_1]

1.     Dear Emelie

Again, thank you so much for coming back and posting again.  I have been wondering about how you’ve been – and reading your post it’s that you haven’t been overly good lately.

That was sad to hear about the cat at the pound, but Emelie, I hope you KNOW that you cannot blame yourself in the slightest for this.  I understand you feel sad about it, but no way, should you be blaming yourself about this.  This was a decision that you didn’t make – it wasn’t in your control.  It’s an extremely terrible and unfortunate thing that happens and I have no doubt how badly effected those poor souls who work at the pound/rspca must feel when things like this happen.   It is sad, but all you can do is to pick up your cat and give it as big a hug and cuddle – if it’ll let you, of course.  🙂  They can be quite their own person when they want to be.  And wow, I’m glad you understood my reference to the little pawing up and down on the spot.

You said your cat does that all the time – why does that not surprise me one bit – I’m suspecting that your cat is one cherished, adored and much loved – as indeed as they all should be.

Exam week can be difficult – but Emelie, as I write this, it’s Thursday – possibly by the time you read this, it’ll be after school on Thursday, meaning you’ve only got one more day to go.  Is that right?   Not sure if you have any further exams next week;  but if you do, you’ve got the weekend to assist you.  If concentration is proving difficult (I really shouldn’t be advising here, I was no good at school, but will have a go anyway), try to break up your study efforts.  I don’t know how you normally operate, if it’s 50 mins study, 10 min break to make up one hour, why not try a 30 min/30 min split or even less – 20 min study, 40 min break.  Doing it this way, it might then not become so daunting for you, if you’ve already got it broken up into more reasonably sized chunks?

Emelie, your post made complete sense – your writing style is very easy to follow and understand.

Getting back to the GP is a good move.  Make sure though that if he prescribes for you any antidepressants that he’ll either give you an indication for what possible side effects they might have (just so you can look out for them) and/or to get a follow-up appointment 4-5 days later to see how you’re going with them?

I hope that you can write back again

Neil