Atra

If what you mean is that this community could benefit from focusing on personal growth and change, I endorse that. And I believe this community can hold space for expression of feelings like isolation and abandonment. Those feelings represent the experience of many who seek a safe harbor here.

Ketamine infusion. My gear for creating a proper setting is sleep mask plus face mask (required), noise-cancelling headphones with my playlist and a scent-diffusing necklace. Add to that the gear they require (IV catheter, O2 saturation sensor, blood pressure cuff, EKG electrodes)--I got more cords coming in and out of me than a desktop computer! Robo-Atra 🤖

That's a tough situation to be in, the anger and disappointment I'm pretty familiar with. Trying different interventions has helped me in my battles with depressive episodes. The first time I recovered from depression I thought would be the last time, and I was wrong. It helped me to accept that like many illnesses, my depression may require a different course of treatment to manage it, sooner or later on in life. Acceptance that I am living with this condition has been a better problem for me than blaming myself or others, or suffering because I resist the fact that I have medication-resistant depression. Which is hard to treat. Wishing you some peace.

First sentence resonates with me. If my experience in therapy taught me anything it's that I don’t need to have worked it out before I open my mouth. When it wasn't just my voice talking to me in my head, I gained awareness of how options I hadn't considered or just dismissed. That's not say that my therapist gave me answers, they don't typically do that. More like an exploration. Coping skills are like tools, they can be acquired but it is up to us whether we use them. Psychoeducation is the term for learning new tools.

In your other post, you said you felt ready to give therapy a chance. Therapy requires us to be open and honest about the battles in our mind, to tell someone we've just met things we can't or won't tell other people we know. And to trust that the therapist is a professional, competent and experienced working with people who have problems similar to your own. You may have or never have had a relationship with another person whom you could be open like that with. If telling your truth is a concern of yours, you can try writing honestly and openly about one or two battles in your head right here on the forums as practice. What do you think? This will sound ironic: we can't change until we accept ourselves as we truly are. To accept (that is not the same as "like") the parts of us we've banished or locked up, we got to be willing to say what must be said to someone who is in a position to help us, hear us and understand us.

Well done on taking a step towards change! The best predictor of a good therapy outcome depends on how good the relationship is between you and the therapist. Therapy will feel uncomfortable at times, but you may trust one therapist more than another for reasons specific to you. Some examples, does the gender of the therapist may matter to you, or age? Do you feel like they're listening, understanding and empathizing with you? Having some questions ready to ask a potential therapist is a good idea. It's important to know if the therapist is accepting new clients. And if you live in the USA, how much is their rate and if it's covered by your insurance? Another question might be how much experience treating people with your diagnosis. Wishing you best of luck finding a new therapist!

Flight (2012) A thoroughly engrossing performance by Denzel Washington. The story has fanciful parts, maybe on occasion breaking immersion. But I like stories which show the torment endured along the path to recovery.

My belief that I can't tolerate embarrassment.

When you're through with waiting for things to get better/change on their own, or waiting for something to change or hoping someone to change you? That is a good time to start therapy. Contemplating change while at the same time being unsure if you're really ready to change, that is a good time. It may be helpful to remind yourself how growth is always an uncomfortable experience and sometimes it's painful yet you've done it throughout life. You'll survive discomfort. This is very difficult but perhaps you're becoming curious if it's a better problem to have than how things are and continue to be? I don't know. I know that for me, learning how to open up, to be vulnerable by dropping my act and my armor was the first significant step I made towards healing. Wishing you peace and some relief from burdens.

Maybe not. It seems like you're considering only what it means to feel worse and what was-normal once felt like, as if those are the only two possibilities for you going forward. But there's also a better-than-normal-ever-was and you're capable of reaching that, too. That better version of you. Not one of us can get there without passing through the dark and heaviness.

New awareness 💙 thank you for this. How that quote beckons me and yet to create a synthesis of the two or cut a middle road, I have much swampland to navigate. I don't want to get lost. I don't want to build a home in the swampland either. Needing a pair of rubber boots and a torch.

I notice some striving some struggling to accept. Feels like I must resolve it yet knowing I can hold more than one truth, even when they're so opposite. I don’t have to resolve it one way or another the third option is I can sit with the tension and know I will be okay.

This is fantastic. That is the struggle in a wonderfully worded paragraph. What I want to tell myself on those occasions when I feel terrible, it's not going to last forever. I don't need to do this perfectly just gotta keep doing what works.

Restaurant brunch with mom and bestie, indoors. Tasting each other's food. Been a year and half since last we've done.

That's certain. I must believe healing is possible for you and everyone because to believe otherwise would mean I doubt that healing is possible for me. Navigating through a broken mental health system that relies on other broken systems, searching for the right sort of help, treated as if we're faceless--that's cause for despair and anger. I have told myself no one cares because that seemed the most sane explanation for the way things are. The best explanation until I found a better one.

Love yourself. Nobody in this world can love you enough to compensate for self-hatred. Heal yourself. No one can heal you except you. It is a cold world and help is everywhere. But nobody can help you until you're ready to be helped. And help usually doesn't come in the form you think it ought to.

Dinner with mom and family for Mother's Day.

This is a turning point right here. And it resonates with me because avoidance is always my go-to defense. Right on my friend. I think growth can only come with some discomfort and facing our fears. Whenever you have a moment when you're unsure if you can do it or should do it, I hope you'll remember what you wrote here. It is more terrifying to continue down a road you've already walked for years knowing exactly where it leads than to do something different. That takes courage and we won't always feel stronger than our fears. But for sure, it's a better problem to confront fear and make change.

I want to let go of my belief that gaining insight into my behavior signifies that I'm ready for change. Insight is nice but the difficulty of change hinges on what I'm willing to do differently.

Deadwind (aka Karppi). Crime drama set in Finland.

Monthly Ketamine infusion. It felt light in intensity despite usual dosage, which seems to occur every now and then. Acquired some insight into a values-based dilemma that's been a source of distress for a while. I suppose this is evidence that I can gain therapeutic value even when the effects of the infusion are mild.

Guy on YouTube who collects and tastes very old military rations. No matter how disgusting the food has become, he will at least inhale a good whiff so he can describe the aromas. 🤮 I can't explain why this is funny to me it just is. 😆

Support group followed by therapy appointment. I unloaded loudly. A ton my emotional crap and for once without tone-policing myself. Then I talked with friends.

The Experiment (audio podcast)

Hey there, welcome. You've done a good job reaching out, explained some tough conditions you live with and how those are undermining your social and work life. That sounds very difficult and I want to reinforce that you're worthwhile and deserve compassion. You mentioned you can still act professionally so I'm wondering what else about you might be considered a strength, virtuous or likeable?