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Clinical depression and grief

Asenna
Blue Voices Member
Blue Voices Member

Hi there peeps.

Ive written on here a number of times so I thought I’d put down some of my thoughts and possibly someone can tell me what is what.

2014 rolled around. Wife and I had found a better place. Life was ok. I had some stressors in my life. A failing family business, a struggling marriage and worry about a diagnosis after a check up (year and half before that I was in correctly diagnosed with liver cancer at 40). Hence the worry. All was fine. 2 weeks after that I started to feel more anxious and started questioning certain ailments and feelings that I had. Could it be cancer? As I started to spiral into anxiety, depression kicked in too. Before you know I severely anxious and very depressed. I was so scared I always needed reassurance on a constant basis. That went on for almost a year. My psych told me it was trauma but If I look back on I now I didnt have flashbacks, I didn’t have nightmares and I didn’t think about it. I was just overly anxious desperate and depressed. I knew it would effect my marriage and surely enough my wife left almost exactly a year after my mental illness hit me.

For the next 3 years I begged, pleaded, got angry, gave her space, push it out of my mind, become obsessed, begged, pleaded. Yet I knew her coming back wouldn’t make me feel better whatsoever. My stupid psych said it will take time. It will get better. What he didn’t understand was my mood disorder. I felt horrible. Sure there were periods where I felt ok but it would always comeback. I wanted her so badly. In reality I needed her. I was sad that she was gone yet I couldn’t make myself better. It’s now been over 3 years since she left and over 4 years since my anxiety and depression hit. I know it’s not gone as I still fight it everyday yet and I’ve thankfully changed psychiatrists.

These are what are going through my head;

rumination, deep sadness, anxiety, loneliness, useless, no self esteem, unlovable, feel like a failure, no enthusiasm for life, deep despair about my past with my relationship, no hope, feelings of a lost life, guilt, longing for the past (not her but our relationship, fear of the future, scared, memories of the relationship, not good enough, grief, deep loss, hopelessness.

i can’t keep living like this and I feel like life is leaving me behind. I cannot see a future or a present and I’m sick and tired of it.

Are those attributes are apart of depression and grief?

fab

16 Replies 16

Doolhof
Champion Alumni
Champion Alumni

Hi Asenna (fab),

All those emotions and feelings you have mentioned are certainly a part of depression as far as I am concerned. They are all a very real part of your life right now too aren't they?

You are able to validate how you are feeling and have acknowledged what has helped you reach this point in your life.

Hopefully you can now take some of these emotions and feelings and work out ways to deal with them.

Have you tried Googling "How to deal with grief and loss" you may well find some "formulas" that may help you.

Some people find it helpful to write down how they feel, to write forgiveness letters to yourself and others that you then rip up and destroy after. It helps to get the hurt out and to provide you with greater understanding of how the hurt is manifesting itself with in you.

Is there even just one thing you can do each day to help you feel better about your life?

We can not go backwards. We can not change the past. We have to learn to deal with today.

Today do one thing that you felt unable to do yesterday. Even a small achievement is a huge bonus.

One day at a time sounds like such a stupid statement, it is what has gotten me through the last few weeks though!

Maybe now is the time you can start to reinvent who you want to be.

Cheers from Dools

Asenna
Blue Voices Member
Blue Voices Member
Thank you dools for replying to my essay. This grief thing?!?! I’ve cried so much over it. I know she’s is gone. I know that it will never happen again. YET!! I cannot seem to reconcile it. I’ve cried, I’ve gotten angry, I’ve felt the loneliness that entails grief yet a simple trigger of her seeing someone (I knew already and it was behind me but I thought she may have been single again) blew me away. All of the insecurities, the loss as if it was yesterday, the time that has gone, the struggle I’m having with clinical depression (let’s face it, doesn’t make grief easy) made me feel so useless and worthless, full of despair and deep deep sadness. I feel like such a loser. That I wasn’t good enough. That all my happiness that I worked for and felt, all those achievements such as the birth of my wonderful children are all gone and because I’m so unhappy with my life and she is flourishing i feel so inadequate and unlovable. My mind keeps reminding me of a time when it was awesome and wonderful and shit in even measure and it makes the loss so much more intense. The world is passing me by and I don’t have the mental strength nor the desire to engage it because of my loneliness.

Dyland93
Community Member

Hi Asenna,

Im going through a very similar thing to you, Im grieving the one i love, all the feelings you have im having them too, no two situations are ever the same, but i feel like i've lost a part of me, i look back at the times we were happy together, and it tears me apart. i also suffer from severe anxiety and depression, and grieving on top of that feels insurmountable, i cant tell you things to make you feel better but at least i can give you someone to relate too, i feel so alone and its so tolling,

keep your chin up and keep moving forward thats all you can do

look forward to hearing back from you

Kind Regards,

Asenna
Blue Voices Member
Blue Voices Member
Hey Dylan, thanks for replying. How long have you been separated? I feel that the clinical depression unfortunately amplifies the grief 2 fold. If it not for the depression and the accompanying anxiety I think we’d feel grief like majority of non mentally ill people. But I do concur that something has died in our hearts and the depression just adds to it. For me my depression had been under control since 97 or so but felt it gingerly over the years from 2010 slowly creep up. It wasn’t till I was incorrectly told I had cancer that I didn’t have that the stress of those words started the ball rolling. On top of an unhappy wife who wasn’t sure that the marriage was good for her (her words), a failing business slowly dying and the stress of the past diagnosis. What tipped me over was another check up for something completely different that pushed me over the edge. My anxiety levels when up to 11, total despair, intense rumination and the inability to deal with it brought on thoughts of failure and hopelessness. My wife thought I should be able to think my way out of it but there is no fight you can win when clinical depression and anxiety hit. That and the fact I leaned on her so much and spoke about to her constantly wore her down and she left. My attention turned to getting her back. Not to lose her but how could I when the depression and the grief was ripping me apart. I was desperate because I needed her and that comfort. Yet I knew even if she came back the depression was still there because of misguided attention from my psyc. My future felt destroyed and I’ve felt utterly lonely since

Asenna
Blue Voices Member
Blue Voices Member

What has been recommended to you by your psych if you don’t mind me asking. How long were you together, who initiated it, are there children involved and how long has it been since the separation?

fab

Doolhof
Champion Alumni
Champion Alumni

Hi Asenna and Dyland,

Depression, anxiety and grief are a somewhat lethal combination aren't they!

My unresolved grief stems from a totally different situation than you are experiencing, but it is still intense grief. Just briefly, I have had 5 pregnancies but no live babies.

My husband and I are still together, living in the house almost separately. My heart aches for the life I was unable to have with live children, with being a family, with having a husband who was there for me in some way.

I feel it helps to share how you are feeling about your grief, to try to accept it is there and find ways to move on. Certainly not easy things to do at all.

I need to find ways to feel better about myself. To realise I can not change the past, I can work on today and that might be all I can manage for now.

It hurts deeply desiring something you can't have, so maybe trying to accept what we do still have is worth an effort.

I don't know if these words are helping or not. Finding a sense of self is important I feel.

From Dools

Asenna
Blue Voices Member
Blue Voices Member

Hey there dools. I’m so sorry to hear about your pregnancies. It must be so hard to deal with and it would bring anyone down. Are you saying your husband wasn’t supportive and still isn’t. He could be going through his own grief and still is. Men are complex creatures. Very mis understood.

For me was in the way she left and where I was at that time. I was still suffering from depression.......you know what telling it again is futile. It doesn’t change a thing. She left because she wasn’t happy. I blamed myself. I blamed my lack of direction. I blamed myself for my weakness. I blamed myself for not making her happy. I blamed myself being needy. I blamed myself for not being what she wanted. It is why I hurt. It’s why it hurts to know that she is dating. Because whoever she is with, he is not me. That whoever they maybe they will always be better than me and I just cannot seem to reconcile that. She left me because I just wasn’t what she wanted. That is soooo difficult to come to terms with it. I feel so unlovable. I get excited briefly when I meet a new girl to only get close and the memories of my failed relationship rips me apart and just makes me so bloody sad. The loss doesn’t want it leave me. So the new girl sees me cry and sees how broken I am and pulls away. I feel very broken and I don’t know whether it’s my depression that makes me feel this or that’s just me in general. Let me tell you, I get thoughts of them being together or going away together and it makes me ill and Uncomfortable. I seriously thought I was past that but here I am triggered again from an innocent comment from my kids telling me mummy went to Tasmania with a “friend”. 🤷🏻‍♂️

a

Doolhof
Champion Alumni
Champion Alumni

Hi Asenna,

Thanks for your kind words. From the beginning I have known my husband has his own way of dealing with our babies. He did not see them in hospital, he did not attend the funerals, he has never spoken their names, looked at their photos or wanted to speak about the losses in any kind of way.

I have accepted all of that. It is not how I had wanted it, but I realise he has to deal with it all in his own way. I know that trying to talk about it upsets him so I don't.

When we moved to this house years ago, I asked him to help me plant some rose bushes. He has no idea that to me they are symbols of my love for our children. He helped me and that is all that matters.

My husband and I both suffer from depression and we have nearly broken up a few times. I am so very sorry that your wife decided to leave when you really needed her to be there for you.

Depression and mental health issues are difficult to deal with. It is really hard to let someone you love go. Your sense of pain and blame is still so strong and raw. I hope in time (don't you just hate that expression...not sure what other words to use!) you can let go of the sense of blame.

I blamed myself for years for the deaths of our babies even though the Drs. said there was nothing I could have done to save them.

Maybe there was nothing you could have done at that time to save your marriage. Your wife made the decision. We have little control over what others do.

Do you feel confident with the medical people who are assisting you at present?

It seems to me in your last post that you have been able to express your hurt and feelings very clearly. I certainly find it helps to write things down. Hopefully it is helping you as well.

This week can you do one thing that will help you to feel better about yourself and your life?

Wishing you a day where you are able to find some sense of hope! It is there!

Cheers from Dools

Asenna
Blue Voices Member
Blue Voices Member

Hey dools. Good to hear from you. It’s hard to understand what came first. The chicken or the egg! Is your depression for the both of you accumulated from such significant losses or had it always been there prior to the losses?

In regards to the blame, I have accepted that I’m not to blame but instead I gave you an idea of what was going through my mind for a while after we separated. Yet as I said, trying to get her back wouldn’t of stopped the sadness. I knew that. I felt that. I wanted her back because I didn’t want to lose the only consistent thing in my life. That companionship. For me the chicken and egg analogy determines what came first. 2014 saw my depression whack me for six. What set it apart from my first breakdown in 97 was 14, I was still on meds so it masked some elements of the depression. That was the part that confused me. My psych at the time said it was trauma yet I wasn’t thinking about that, I didnt have nightmares nor any flashbacks. Only looking back on it, it was my clinical depression ripping through. I became so melancholic, deep sadness. Like a feeling of massive loss. I didnt feel me and that scared me.

I want to feel happy and put all that has happened to me in the past. I only just acknowledged that by not seeing her or even looking at her, avoiding relics from our past including photos and letters is simply adding to pain. Perhaps I need to sit with them and spend time in it, look at her and not avoid her. BUT, I worry that it will trigger me again.

My new psych says it’s clinical depression. I have to believe him, yet I didn’t believe the other one. So, yet I remain skeptical.

Fab