JessiesMom

I can understand. Somehow letting the people close to you know what it really going on with you can feel like asking for attention, or even worse, whining. There are very few people in my life with whom I feel as thought I can be completely transparent - there always seems to be a need to keep up a good face. Hope you can find what you need here 😉

below zero - brrrrrr.

I have never done something like that. Based on your post I did a little bit of research into the movement. From what I understand it is a silent retreat with very little human interaction. The idea is to introspect. For someone who is an introvert - I think that it could be very useful. However, if you are an extravert, it might not be a great fit for you. Hope this helps.

Realization of why I feel the way I feel can sometimes help me to fight the self-defeating voice of my anxiety and depression. It does not make it go away, but it does help me to recognize it for what it is. A little background - I was raised by a narcissistic mother and a father who was dealing with his own issues. Any "true self" I had was reduced to dust by my mother's need to always be the center of attention. I was never good enough. It did not help that I am not a naturally tidy person and my mother is a clean freak. All I wanted was for her to tell me that she was proud of me. It has never happened and I have had to accept the fact that it is unlikely to ever happen. The closest I every came to hearing that was after I gave birth to my first son. After 24 hours of labor, 3 hours of pushing and more stitches than I care to think about - she said, "Well, I guess I'll never call you a hypochondric again." All of this leads me to a place where my brain is always telling me that I am the problem. If my husband is crabby because of the checking account balance - my brain tells me that he is trying to tell me that I am bad and it is all my fault. Everything feel personal. I worry that saying the wrong thing or doing the wrong thing even a single time will cause my friends to "see the real me" and abandon me. I worry that if I mess up at work, I'll get fired and never find another job again. Every misstep my children make causes me to blame myself. It is frankly sometime exhausting. The realization of how my childhood programmed me to think, helps me to look at these situations more logically and tell my brain to shut the hell up. It has also given me the ability to help other people in my family to communicate - because I can see what is behind the words and help them to understand each other.

My 11 year old daughter and my 18 year old son have been enjoying Minecraft for the last few weeks. They have been enjoined in a prank war on their shared server. Their 20 year old brother plays there too, but he was not involved in the mayhem. Yesterday my daughter decided to fill her brother's house with bees. Apparently she forgot to close the door of the house before spawning the bees and ended up filling the entire world with bees. She had to consult with the 20 year old to figure out what to do.

Welcome Lucas, I too found myself out of step with the people around me. To some degree, I still am. I have heard many of the things that you say people say when you reveal your depression. I hear quite a few of those things too. What those people do not understand is that depression does not go away because your pray, or excercize. It is not a choice that we can "think positive" and get out of. I hope that you can find what you are looking for here.

My heart bleeds for you in this situation. I have been there. I grew up in a family dominated by a narcissistic mother and in my house being called selfish was the worst thing you could be called. It took me a long time to realize that the problem was not me. I was just trying to live me life and get my own emotional needs me. Doing this was considered selfish. It sounds like you may be in the position of scapegoat in your family. The problem is not you girl. There is nothing wrong with you - never forget that. You are deserving of having your needs met. Asking for that is not selfish - it is human. Asking someone to stop berating you and forever reminding you of the mistakes in your past is not selfish. All you are asking is for her to be kind and compassionate. You are in no way required to validate her feeling or even put up with her telling you that you are horrible. It is her behavior that is unacceptable - not yours. You do not deserve this treatment - no one does. I would not wish my childhood on my worst enemy, because it caused me to doubt myself and my own worth for years. I still do. Right now you are in a difficult position, because, as a teenage (is that correct?) you cannot distance yourself from them. This will not always be the case. The best thing I ever did was go away to college. It allowed me to learn who I had the potential to be away from her and the chaos of my family. It took a long time, but eventually I was able to become friendly with my siblings and we became a unit that was able to support each other when the parental situation becomes chaotic. I would guess that in 10 years - you will be someone different. Allow yourself to love yourself as you are - you are deserving of that.

Wow - definetly could be anxiety. I am glad to hear that it is getting better with the medication.

Is the thing you are describing with a falling in the pit of your stomach? Or is it more like you are trying to walk on a ship that is in a storm? If the former, that sounds to me like an anxious response. If the later, it sounds like vertigo. Anxiety is rather like a fear response - but a fear response that is associated to something or someone that would not generally be described as fear inducing. For example, cleaning induces an anxious response in me. Clearly, there is nothing dangerous about cleaning my house. Vertigo tends to be associated with disruption of the middle ear (I think), but can also result from a sudden drop in blood pressure (as when standing up). You mentioned both ringing in your ears and lower blood pressure as side effects of your current medication. If what you are experiencing is vertigo - it could be a further side effect. Hope this is helpful. In any case, it would probably be best to talk about it with your perscribing doctor.

I rather like this way of looking at these tests and their results. Perhaps instead of looking at them as being defining (this is what I am and I can't change it), they could be looked at as sort of diagnostic of places in our lives where we need to put in some work. So instead of, "Oh, I'm an introvert - therefore I am not going to accept that position that requires lots of public speaking." it could be, "the test says that I am an introvert, and I can make the hard choice and do something out of my comfort zone." A question that it always difficult for me is the one that goes something like this - do you keep a clean room or put things where ever. I am not generally an orderly person - but I usually know where things are. My childhood bedroom was often in a state of disorder. When I was compelled to clean it the response I would get from my mother when I asked her, "Are you proud of me?" was along the lines of, "Doesn't it feel so much better to be in a clean room?" When I was at home with my children, I spent quite a bit of time cleaning and organizing the house. I took pride in the face that my house was in good shape and I tended to see that as a virtue. Quite a bit of this came from the fact that my mother was and still is an obsessive cleaner. I have realized that for her, cleaning was an anxiety relieving activity, but that it was definetly a bit OCD in nature. Doing the cleaning would relieve the anxiety, but since all things tend toward chaos - the relief was short lived and soon would return. This has gotten worse as she has gotten older and now most of her grandkids would prefer not to spend time with her. About 6 years or so ago, I returned to the ranks of the full-time employed and things changed at home. I did not have the time to keep things as orderly as before - and I discovered that I was ok with that. The difficulty is that, now, cleaning tends to cause me anxiety. It is as though I have developed a blind spot to the mess - and when I start to clean it up - it seems insurmountable. So, how to answer the question? Was I more myself when I kept everything in place, or am I just a messy person?

So glad that you had your friends. Christmas can be a really crappy day - mostly because you have this idea in your head that it is supposed to be wonderful. The picture in your head that our society has given you contrasts so much with your actual life - it can be really horrible. Hang in there.

I am always interested in challenging questions. As I see it, the difficulty with most personality tests is two fold. One, the questions they ask are generally subjective and can be manipulated to match what we think are more socially acceptable traits. For example, if a questions asks if you prefer a large group of friends or a few close friends - and you think that extroversion is more socially acceptable than introversion - you can answer in a way to get the results you want to get. Two, a personality test result can be used as a crutch for non productive or difficult behavior. For example, my husband is and INFJ. He tends to use this as a reason that he cannot or does not do some things that would be positive for our relationship - like answer questions I ask or even just engage in small talk with me. Also, mental illness symptoms can affect the way you answer questions and can come to be see (by you) as a part of your personality rather than a symptom. I would be interested in hearing other people's thoughts.

Welcome! I hope that you find what you need here. I am always in need of an extra friend 😉

This one always makes me laugh derisivly - like anyone would choose this disease. And the "pray it away" is just another type of victim blaming. It sounds like what you really need is a substitute family - basically a group of friends who will support you emotionally.

I think the answer is a little of both. You should urge him to get treatment, and also be understanding of the fact that he may not be able to meet all of your emotional needs right now. I am in a bit of the opposite situation. I am the one in my relationship who suffers from depression and I have always appreciated his encouragement of getting treatment - and I appreciate his willingness to pickup the pieces sometimes when I fall apart.