Depression and Anxiety Thread

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I guess 'talking about it' means different things to different people. A very good friend of mine who has struggled with depression all his life didn't really want to talk about depression, he just wanted someone to talk to in general - it was very difficult for him and he attempted suicide at least once, but he also did the opposite and attempted things that he didn't think were possible before; just speaking to people (no doubt dealing with a bunch of assholes and rejections along the way) but in general he found it worked out for him... he also had a real difficulty with the professional help he sought, but at the end of the day he got through it by a mixture of professional help (minimal) and confiding in friends and family. Thankfully, friends nowadays are just a click away.
In my view, unless you really need to solve problems by going deeper on depression, talking about something you like other than that can not only make you forget about not only the depression itself, but also bad things and flame baits such as politics and some people moans, which is a good thing.

Get a hobby guys, and people you like and comfortable with. Better than some doctors and medicine imho.
 
Don't try to diagnose yourself by searching on the internet. The internet is full of crap and if you don't know where to look or what you should look for, you'd better off not knowing than thinking you found the solution on the web.

Go and see a doctor, psychiatrist, psychologist or whatever to get a diagnosis.
Yes, only a doctor or trained professional can diagnose. But it can be helpful to bring up specific conditions and the symptoms that you feel match, as this will either help them reach a diagnosis faster, or allow them to ease your mind by deciding you don't fit the profile.
 
Yes, only a doctor or trained professional can diagnose. But it can be helpful to bring up specific conditions and the symptoms that you feel match, as this will either help them reach a diagnosis faster, or allow them to ease your mind by deciding you don't fit the profile.
I still think it's a dangerous thing, trying to come up with a diagnosis through the internet.

What if the information on the internet is wrong?
What if you give somebody this wrong information to easy somebodies mind?

If one doesn't have a medical degree, nobody can make a diagnosis correctly just by looking up all the crap and wrong information that is on the internet. Everybody can write stuff on the internet and even pretend to be a doctor/psychiatrist. No, the only person I trust are the one whom have a medical degree. And even they can be wrong.

E.g.; it has been proven that benzodiazopines have an adverse effect on me, a wrong effect. When I took Lysanxia, I went from a light/mild depression into a very, very severe depression in only 4 days and had 4 or 5 very severe anxiety attacks, so severe that I had to call the ambulance. A few weeks later, the same with Xanax but no anxiety attacks. When I stopped taking Lysanxia and Xanas I went back to my light/mild depression in just 3/4 days.
The same with Lorazepam. This is also a benzo as Lysanxia and Xanax. When I told my psychiatrist that my depression couldn't be cured as long as I'm on Lorazepam, he said that that is impossible. Even my personal doctor said that it is not possible.
Well after a few weeks, I came in contact with another, much younger, psychiatrist and he said that it is written in medical books that benzos can stimulate depression. After some talking, he confirmed what I believed was true and the other psychiatrists I talked to denied it to be true. Now that I have been lowering the dosage of Lorazepam very carefully, I start to feel that the anti depressant start to overcome the negative effects of the Lorazepam.

My current psychiatrist also agrees that the Lorazepam is keeping me in a depression.


What I'm trying to say is that even medical people can be wrong. This is even more true for the internet.
 
I don't disagree with you, but I'd offer that I found it helpful to tell my doctor about conditions that seemed related to what I was going through, as a way to indicate the kinds of symptoms I was experiencing and allow her to ask more informed questions.

I'm not suggesting that anyone try to diagnose themselves from internet research, or even take a doctor's diagnosis at face value with out a second opinion.
I'm just saying that research can be helpful if you recognize that the goal is not to diagnose, but to help describe your symptoms.

Don't go to your doctor and say "I decided I have narcissistic personality disorder."

I also found it worthwhile to start understanding disorders I don't have in order to be more supportive and understanding of those who do.
 
The first time I tried to find information on the internet, this was in 2006, about the subject that worried me, resulted in a severe depression. :lol: Why? Because I didn't know better and all the information I found was wrong and made me worry even more. It took me 3 months to sink in a severe depression from mental exhaustion. Now after 11 years, I still have to recover from this ordeal. I know better now, if there is something that worries me, don't go searching the internet for answer because 9 times out of 10, the information you find is wrong and can make things worse.

I'm not suggesting that anyone try to diagnose themselves from internet research, or even take a doctor's diagnosis at face value with out a second opinion.
Second opinion is what actually saved me this time. As I said in my previous post, if I stayed with the psychiatrist I started seeing in 2006, I was getting worse instead of getting better. I knew that I was right about the Benzos but he didn't believe me. He even mentioned Lithium because he misdiagnosed me and didn't believe me it was Lorazepam to blame. His initial theory that my depression didn't get better was caused by my anxieties (which were actually partially caused by Lorazepam I took and Lysanxia and Xanax he prescribed). When he noticed that what he did didn't help me at all, he said that my problem was that I racked my brain too much. He was wrong, again. I didn't gave him another change and got meself another psychiatrist.
Even my personal doctor, whom thinks he knows me so well (he does but only to a limited extend) and was in contact with my previous psychiatrist, said that I was the cause that my depression didn't get better. He, and the psychiatrist initially said that it was anxiety, after that; it was the racking my brain thing and now he says that I have a Lorazepam obsession, which is the biggest BS I have ever heard from him. I told him that sometimes I forget to take my Lorazepam. You know what he said; "well that is the obession". WTF, forgetting to take medication is an obsession? He still says that Lorazepam is not the problem, not even after all the evidence that I'm getting better, very slowly, since I started lowering the dosage of the Lorazepam, that my new psychiatrist wrote him in a report that it is a Lorazepam problem, the fact that I know myself and what I feel is different than what I felt with my previous depressions and that it is written in medical books that Benzodiazipines can stimulate depression.
That is why I got another psychiatrist and she agrees with me, that the Benzo (Lorazepam) is the cause of all my problems from the last 6 and a half month.
So, yes, I agree that a second opinion can be very helpful and the right thing to do in some cases.
I'm just saying that research can be helpful if you recognize that the goal is not to diagnose, but to help describe your symptoms.
This I can't agree with. Symptoms is what you feel and that is what you have to tell the doctor. If you do research on the internet to help describe your symtoms, you are not objective anymore. I absolutely don't need the internet to describe what I'm feeling/going through aka symptoms. I think it is even better to objectively describe what you're feeling/going through (your symptoms) instead of finding stuff on the web that seems to match your symptoms.
But that is my opinion.
If you feel better by researching your problems by consulting the internet and you think it can help you, by all means, don't listen to me and do what is best for you.

I also found it worthwhile to start understanding disorders I don't have in order to be more supportive and understanding of those who do.
If it is a part of your personality and character, you will be automatically supportive and understanding without having to search on the web.
But I understand what you mean. Some people are so judgemental when they don't understand certain things that is going on with other people, that they need to be thaught before they can even show a little bit of sympathy.


Be gentle with me when quoting because I don't want to relapse in another depression. :P
:D :lol:
 
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Nah, you're pretty much right.

I should point out that when I did research, I skipped the random internet articles and jumped straight to medical resources, including printing out the diagnostic criteria for personality disorders from the DSM V.

It didn't help describe symptoms in the sense of the overall picture, but more in terms of being able to differentiate, say, withdrawal and anhedonia.

Even then, that is less helpful for describing anything, but more to help pay attention to what's going on when I act a certain way. Like, when I avoid things at work, is it because I'm avoiding social situations, or just because I don't feel like doing my job? It's much easier to answer that if I'm paying attention in the moment than if I try to remember what I was thinking weeks later.

As far as being supportive, I don't mean that I'm not usually supportive if I don't understand what someone's going through. I mean more that I like to know what are helpful and unhelpful things to say and do for someone. My parents don't know how to talk to me about depression. They have said things like "man up" and "it'll get better" which obviously weren't helpful. But of course they thought they were being supportive. I'd like to avoid those mistakes whenever possible.

Ideally, you could ask people what you can do to help. Unfortunately, not everyone responds well to that question, and even I'm not sure how I would answer it.

Just as an afterthought, I do remember taking psychology courses in college. And I'm reading a book right now about interesting aspects of human rationality (more often irrationality). Considering the prevalence of mental disorders, I'd imagine if learning about mental health was so damaging, psychology students would be putting themselves at risk just by going to class. Though somehow I wouldn't be surprised if psych students had a higher rate of diagnosis of mental illness...
 
Nah, you're pretty much right.
Thanks, you make me blush. :embarrassed:

:P

I should point out that when I did research, I skipped the random internet articles and jumped straight to medical resources, including printing out the diagnostic criteria for personality disorders from the DSM V.
How do you know that these websites are genuine medical websites? I don't know, I can't say and therein lies the danger.



Even then, that is less helpful for describing anything, but more to help pay attention to what's going on when I act a certain way. Like, when I avoid things at work, is it because I'm avoiding social situations, or just because I don't feel like doing my job? It's much easier to answer that if I'm paying attention in the moment than if I try to remember what I was thinking weeks later.
This part is a pleasure to read. Why? Not because of the internet search giving you answers but because you ask yourself what is going on with you. Because you ask yourself questions about yourself. Because you are curious and want to find answers. This is the first step in the healing proces because you acknowledge, admit to yourself that there is something wrong with you. Your search on the internet, asking questions, thinking about your actions, your behaviour is the right thing to do but don't overthink, don't get obessed by trying to find the answers. It will come to you.
Self-knowledge is the beginning of wisdom. You are trying to know yourself! GOOD! 👍

As far as being supportive, I don't mean that I'm not usually supportive if I don't understand what someone's going through. I mean more that I like to know what are helpful and unhelpful things to say and do for someone. My parents don't know how to talk to me about depression. They have said things like "man up" and "it'll get better" which obviously weren't helpful. But of course they thought they were being supportive. I'd like to avoid those mistakes whenever possible.
Ideally, you could ask people what you can do to help. Unfortunately, not everyone responds well to that question, and even I'm not sure how I would answer it.
I never ask what is going on or try to give somebody a pep talk before the other person starts talking about it. You can be supportive by being a friend and have fun. This is sometimes more helpful and supportive than trying to find the right words to support some-one.
I'll never ask what is going on. I think that if the person whom has problems, has the need to talk about it or has the need for support, will start talking about his/her problems. It is then that I try to be supportive by trying to say the right things.
Being a friend can be more supportive than asking what is going on and trying to help.


Just as an afterthought, I do remember taking psychology courses in college. And I'm reading a book right now about interesting aspects of human rationality (more often irrationality). Considering the prevalence of mental disorders, I'd imagine if learning about mental health was so damaging, psychology students would be putting themselves at risk just by going to class. Though somehow I wouldn't be surprised if psych students had a higher rate of diagnosis of mental illness...
Yep, I think so too.

A lot of students going to medical school have to drop out because they can't cope with all the medical information.
 
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How do you know that these websites are genuine medical websites? I don't know, I can't say and therein lies the danger.
I mean, I literally printed a pdf from the American Psychiatric Association, along with some questionnaires on some other official medical journal site. I'm not talking about web MD here. Though I will admit that most people won't even think about going that route. The reason I did was because I recognized the conflicting information from other sites, and tried to find the most scientifically supported source.

I think I can say something you'll agree with:

Keep a journal!

Writing down my thoughts and actions as they happen has helped me share with my therapist without forgetting things after a week.

I also have an app called Daylio that tracks my mood and what kinds of activites I've had going on, which helps identify what kinds of things affect my mood and how.
 
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Web MD is what got me in trouble this time (september 22st). I read a lie and a contradiction and I believed the lie and voilà, >> depression.

Keeping a journal and writing down thoughts doesn't work for me. Writing down keywords and questions though, that is my way of not forgetting things to ask.
 
This afternoon, I forgot to take my 0.50mg Lorazepam. Later today I remembered that I forgot to take this damn pill and thought; let's see what is going to happen tomorrow when I don't take it. Well, ..... I didn't have to wait until tomorrow to find out. About one hour ago, I started shaking, trembling etc and it was then that I knew that I'm really hooked on these meds. Tuesday I already lowered the dosage with 0.25mg. That would make it 0.75mg in a couple of days. Mmmm, too much?! :P
0.25mg less every week is enough it seems.
 
This I can't agree with. Symptoms is what you feel and that is what you have to tell the doctor. If you do research on the internet to help describe your symtoms, you are not objective anymore.

I disagree. Medicine, like any specialist field, has certain terms that are used in ways that are not necessarily what a layman might use them to mean. Prime example being "depression" itself.

Just experiencing the symptoms sometimes isn't enough to be able to describe them clearly to another person, especially when you're trying to describe what's going on inside your own head. What's more, if one was like me and had been in and out of depression one's entire life but only recently diagnosed, one might not exactly have the best idea about what was "normal" and what was a symptom.

Doctor's visits tend to be short, they don't have six hours for me to tell them every detail of my life and let them sort it out; they need me to condense to what I think is relevant. And if what I think is relevant isn't the whole story, I'm gonna get a bad diagnosis.

There are certainly bad roads out there to do with feeding yourself wrong or misleading information. But I'm a scientist by trade, so I'm never going to say that being less informed is preferable. Not long term, anyway. Short term, yeah, there are some days that maybe you just can't handle stuff.

Just about everything on the internet is at best anecdotal, and so while it can be very useful one shouldn't put much more weight on it than what you'd hear down at the local pub.
 
Gonna quote this from somewhere else on GTP because no one really responded to what i said.
Sorry if it's not related to what this conversation is about for but why not talk a bit about my depression?

If you been reading my posts in the depression thread, you would know that I have some problems. I won't talk about that tho, instead I will just jump straight to what I have been doing since.

So I went to a new doctor couple months ago and started helping me out. Soon i started to become better and better. He also told me to get to some medicines from a local pharmacy.

I have been using it and it helped for the most of the days. However recently after couple of weeks, I noticed some side effects. One is it takes much longer for me to produce...I'm not sure how to say this since yeah...I don't want to say this to anybody.
Another thing however, for the last couple of days it seems, everytime I wake up from my sleep I get some worry and anxiety for no reason. Sometimes I feel like as if someone said something wrong about me or been in a fight with someone i really close to. Then couple minutes later, it's gone only to come back after I sleep and wake up again.

I don't understand why this is happening to me but I think it's because of the "drug" I use.

I just liked to share this with you guys, wondering what you think about this.

I hope you all have a great day, thanks.
 
I disagree. Medicine, like any specialist field, has certain terms that are used in ways that are not necessarily what a layman might use them to mean. Prime example being "depression" itself.
And these terms are known to medical people, not the patient. The patient has to rely on simple language and explain what he/she is feeling. That is how it works; patient tells, doctor listens and ask questions. So, I stand by what I said before.

Just experiencing the symptoms sometimes isn't enough to be able to describe them clearly to another person, especially when you're trying to describe what's going on inside your own head.
Symptoms, like in many examples in this thread, is all what the patient has. A good doctor will know what is going on when the patients tells him/her what she/he is feeling, thinking.
Depression is very easy to diagnose for a medical trained person. If the patient says a few words such as; can't eat, can't sleep, don't feel well, I'm bored, want to die, life sucks, a doctor immediately knows that this patient has at least a depression. But a depression is just a general diagnosis which will need further research to find out what this patient has.
After that, the patient will be send to a specialist whom will do more research, ask more questions, do test etc... . At one point they will find out what is wrong with the patient and that because the patienst started telling his/her symptoms to a doctor in the first place. Doctors are trained for this. Even if a patient can't clearly describe the symptoms, the doctor will find out what is going on. That is their job.
Symptoms is all what a patient has. They don't have a medical knowledge so they have to and only can rely on their symptoms explained to a doctor is simple words.

What's more, if one was like me and had been in and out of depression one's entire life but only recently diagnosed, one might not exactly have the best idea about what was "normal" and what was a symptom
You must have know that there was something wrong. I always felt that there was something wrong with me and that I didn't behave "normal" in certain circumstances. I always looked at other people, compared myself with them and asked myself why I was afraid to do certain things other people didn't seem to bother. Or why I would do something differently. Some people will tell you that what you do isn't "normal".
In your case, you probably knew there was something wrong, I guess. Well even if you didn't know what was "normal" and what was a symptom, a doctor would have found out if you started telling what you're "feelings" are, what is bothering you. It is not up to the patient to know what is a symptom and what not, what is wrong with him/her. It's up to the doctor to find out and this through listening to the patient who will tell the doctor what he/she is feeling aka symptoms.

Doctor's visits tend to be short, they don't have six hours for me to tell them every detail of my life and let them sort it out; they need me to condense to what I think is relevant. And if what I think is relevant isn't the whole story, I'm gonna get a bad diagnosis
A good doctor doesn't need six hours. Half an hour is plenty to come to a general diagnosis. If not, this doctor sucks big time. Afterwards, there will be more visits to doctors and specialists who will find out what is wrong with this patient to get a good diagnosis.



Gonna quote this from somewhere else on GTP because no one really responded to what i said.
You have answered your question yourself. Yes, it is probably the medication that is to blame.

From every medication, people get side effects. The side effects usually start after a while. You can even get side effects of herbs, homeophaty. Most of the side effects go away when the body is getting used to the drug. You can even get side effects from food. :P
 
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You must have know that there was something wrong. I always felt that there was something wrong with me and that I didn't behave "normal" in certain circumstances. I always looked at other people, compared myself with them and asked myself why I was afraid to do certain things other people didn't seem to bother. Or why I would do something differently. Some people will tell you that what you do isn't "normal".
In your case, you probably knew there was something wrong, I guess. Well even if you didn't know what was "normal" and what was a symptom, a doctor would have found out if you started telling what you're "feelings" are, what is bothering you.

So if you start getting hit by depression when you're six because your parents drop you in a foreign country with no support network, you really have no reference for what "normal" should be. If you try to ask parents, teachers and other adults and they simply tell you that everyone feels like you do, you tend to believe them. Because you're six. And how would you know otherwise.

So by the time you get to your teens and actually have enough life experience that you might have been able to pick up on some of your symptoms being abnormal, you've got 5+ years of authority figures telling you that it's just how it is and 5+ years of experience of just living with it. You've got parents writing it off as not a problem, and just something you have to deal with. You've got doctors and counsellors saying that it's just how kids are and you'll grow out of it. You've got teachers who frankly have way more on their plate and have no real chance of discriminating depression from a kid who is just a pain in the neck. And to be honest, I'm pretty sure a couple of the teachers did pick it and did their best, but they can't do much when my parents refuse to recognise what's going on.

So by the time you're an adult this is pretty strongly trained into you that this is just how people are, and that you simply deal with it less well than others. That, and it's been pretty strongly trained into you not to complain about it and that nobody else will help. Keep in mind also that everyone doesn't get taught as a child exactly what depression is. Unless you or someone you know suffers then you've got a reasonable chance of thinking that it's chronic sadness.

Of course, my dad did suffer and simply chose not to tell any of us. Or take any action despite knowing that it has a genetic component, and that I was going through a lot of BS in my childhood that any halfway decent psychologist would have immediately called risk for depression.

And so it takes a semi-professional gamer who I follow to almost commit suicide for me to become aware of depression. The guy's life seems pretty OK by most people's standards, yet "depression" makes him almost kill himself. This doesn't fit with what I understood as depression. I read more. I learn about symptoms and how it really makes people feel from people who have suffered, rather than the stereotypical model that gets shown on sitcoms.

So I notice that actually this largely describes me for the last 25 years. Talking with some of my better friends and asking the right questions, it turns out that no, everyone else does not go through what I did. I got the perfect storm of susceptible genetics, a childhood that was pretty rough, parents who didn't really give a 🤬 and a community of people around me that either missed it or were in no position to be able to help. The laundry list of stuff that makes my life difficult is 90% depression and anxiety symptoms, and whenever something goes wrong in my life (like losing four jobs in four years to arseholes trying to steal my money and screw me over) it comes out full force.

And so because this was all trained into me from the age of six, yeah, it took lists symptoms and it all being spelled out to me on the internet. Without that I'd still be thinking I was just having a rough time like everyone else does when life gives you lemons. You can only know what you're taught, and if you have your whole childhood being taught that your "problems" are not problems, how are you supposed to know any different?

Maybe for you, you always knew something was wrong. Some of us were unlucky enough to have a community surrounding us that went to rather extraordinary lengths to convince us that our mental illness was normal and that everyone else was the same, that there was no need to change, that the fault was with us personally and that we just needed to suck it up and get on with life.

I think for those of us like that, having a list of things to look at is helpful. Being able to see my years of symptoms alongside something saying "this is an illness, there are treatments, go see a doctor and tell them about it" was a :censored:ing breakthrough.

Had the internet been commonplace when I was a teenager, I might have dodged a lot of it. Probably not though, because I probably wouldn't have known to start looking. How does a blind person know that there's such a thing as sight unless someone else tells them about it?

Gonna quote this from somewhere else on GTP because no one really responded to what i said.

What's the drug they've got you on?

Anti-depressants can have all sorts of side effects on different people, but you shouldn't have to live with one like that. There are lots of different drugs, so you can keep trying until you find one that is more compatible with your body or has side effects that you find less objectionable.

I recommend going back and talking to your doctor. Be clear that this is very distressing. The doctor may say that it will go away with time. They may recommend changing to something else. They may tell you that it's simply something you have to deal with.

If it's the latter, it may be true but I'd get a second opinion. I've been burnt with a doctor telling me that before, while a better doctor suggested an alternative that quickly resolved the problem and gave me a much better quality of life. Not to imply that your first doctor isn't doing the best job that they can, it may even be that there's another solution out there that they're not aware of. Depression is a pretty hot topic in medical science at the moment, and there's a lot of progress being made.

Don't be shy about talking about these things with your doctor. They may seem trivial, but they're not. Firstly, it's important for the doctor to understand how your body is reacting to the drugs. Secondly, fighting depression is hard enough work all by itself. You don't need to be fighting major side effects at the same time, you need something that helps you be the best you can be (given the situation).


And yes, the extended time to "produce" is a common side effect of these types of drugs. Some will do it to a greater or lesser extent, but it's almost always there. Unfortunately. As my doctor said, it's an important way for a lot of people to relax and destress, and having that unavailable can be very distressing in and of itself. Try not to worry about it, and enjoy yourself when you can. It's not a permanent thing, if and when you come off the drugs you'll return to normal "functionality". :cheers:
 
What's the drug they've got you on?

Anti-depressants can have all sorts of side effects on different people, but you shouldn't have to live with one like that. There are lots of different drugs, so you can keep trying until you find one that is more compatible with your body or has side effects that you find less objectionable.

I recommend going back and talking to your doctor. Be clear that this is very distressing. The doctor may say that it will go away with time. They may recommend changing to something else. They may tell you that it's simply something you have to deal with.

If it's the latter, it may be true but I'd get a second opinion. I've been burnt with a doctor telling me that before, while a better doctor suggested an alternative that quickly resolved the problem and gave me a much better quality of life. Not to imply that your first doctor isn't doing the best job that they can, it may even be that there's another solution out there that they're not aware of. Depression is a pretty hot topic in medical science at the moment, and there's a lot of progress being made.

Don't be shy about talking about these things with your doctor. They may seem trivial, but they're not. Firstly, it's important for the doctor to understand how your body is reacting to the drugs. Secondly, fighting depression is hard enough work all by itself. You don't need to be fighting major side effects at the same time, you need something that helps you be the best you can be (given the situation).


And yes, the extended time to "produce" is a common side effect of these types of drugs. Some will do it to a greater or lesser extent, but it's almost always there. Unfortunately. As my doctor said, it's an important way for a lot of people to relax and destress, and having that unavailable can be very distressing in and of itself. Try not to worry about it, and enjoy yourself when you can. It's not a permanent thing, if and when you come off the drugs you'll return to normal "functionality". :cheers:
Cipralex, he told me to take it for a month. First week with half a pill and then a full pill for the following weeks. I supposed to come back to him after 2 weeks but couldn't because of the mid term exams. Now that I just finished all the exams, i'm thinking about visiting him this Wednesday. Meanwhile I will try and talk to him via phone. I'm not sure how it will goes.

Also just to point out, he isn't my first doctor ever to talk about this but he was the first doctor that I focused a lot more on my depression and less on my "easy to anger" & some Disorders issue which's almost gone by now.

I'm quite happy seeing you and @kikie reply to me. Feels like that at least some people are willing to pay attention to my problems.

Thank you. :cheers:👍
Cat_Hugging_Kitten.jpg
 
I'm quite happy seeing you and @kikie reply to me. Feels like that at least some people are willing to pay attention to my problems.

Thank you. :cheers:👍
Cat_Hugging_Kitten.jpg

You're welcome. :)

I took escitalopram (which is Cipralex) for about nine months. My experience when I started was that it didn't actually start doing it's thing until sometime in the third week. You may respond differently, but that's at least some anecdotal experience for you.

You may find that some of your other issues are related to your depression. Or not. But if nothing else you'll probably see changes over the next few weeks and that's a good thing.
 
So if you start getting hit by depression when you're six because your parents drop you in a foreign country with no support network, you really have no reference for what "normal" should be. If you try to ask parents, teachers and other adults and they simply tell you that everyone feels like you do, you tend to believe them. Because you're six. And how would you know otherwise.

So by the time you get to your teens and actually have enough life experience that you might have been able to pick up on some of your symptoms being abnormal, you've got 5+ years of authority figures telling you that it's just how it is and 5+ years of experience of just living with it. You've got parents writing it off as not a problem, and just something you have to deal with. You've got doctors and counsellors saying that it's just how kids are and you'll grow out of it. You've got teachers who frankly have way more on their plate and have no real chance of discriminating depression from a kid who is just a pain in the neck. And to be honest, I'm pretty sure a couple of the teachers did pick it and did their best, but they can't do much when my parents refuse to recognise what's going on.

So by the time you're an adult this is pretty strongly trained into you that this is just how people are, and that you simply deal with it less well than others. That, and it's been pretty strongly trained into you not to complain about it and that nobody else will help. Keep in mind also that everyone doesn't get taught as a child exactly what depression is. Unless you or someone you know suffers then you've got a reasonable chance of thinking that it's chronic sadness.

Of course, my dad did suffer and simply chose not to tell any of us. Or take any action despite knowing that it has a genetic component, and that I was going through a lot of BS in my childhood that any halfway decent psychologist would have immediately called risk for depression.

And so it takes a semi-professional gamer who I follow to almost commit suicide for me to become aware of depression. The guy's life seems pretty OK by most people's standards, yet "depression" makes him almost kill himself. This doesn't fit with what I understood as depression. I read more. I learn about symptoms and how it really makes people feel from people who have suffered, rather than the stereotypical model that gets shown on sitcoms.

So I notice that actually this largely describes me for the last 25 years. Talking with some of my better friends and asking the right questions, it turns out that no, everyone else does not go through what I did. I got the perfect storm of susceptible genetics, a childhood that was pretty rough, parents who didn't really give a 🤬 and a community of people around me that either missed it or were in no position to be able to help. The laundry list of stuff that makes my life difficult is 90% depression and anxiety symptoms, and whenever something goes wrong in my life (like losing four jobs in four years to arseholes trying to steal my money and screw me over) it comes out full force.

And so because this was all trained into me from the age of six, yeah, it took lists symptoms and it all being spelled out to me on the internet. Without that I'd still be thinking I was just having a rough time like everyone else does when life gives you lemons. You can only know what you're taught, and if you have your whole childhood being taught that your "problems" are not problems, how are you supposed to know any different?
Sorry to hear what you have been through. Thanks for explaining what you went through and what you meant in your previous post. If I knew this, I would have reacted differently.

Maybe for you, you always knew something was wrong. Some of us were unlucky enough to have a community surrounding us that went to rather extraordinary lengths to convince us that our mental illness was normal and that everyone else was the same, that there was no need to change, that the fault was with us personally and that we just needed to suck it up and get on with life.
Yep, I always knew there was something wrong about me because people told me that I reacted differently and I was aware that I did things differently, on purpose because I was ashamed, hurting etc.... . I had a very good childhood until I was 13 - 14 and than my life started to change for the worse. It was around that age that people; school, classroom, neighbourghs, family, strangers in public, when I went out to clubs trying to enjoy myself, people started to calling me names, pester, bully on a daily basis. And about 7 odd years later I was a completely different person. Introvert, negative, ashamed, afraid all the time to leave the door, no self-confidence anymore, very sensitive to comments, chronically depressed (light depressions ofcourse), inferiority complex etc.... . It had all to do with my appereance that I was bullied, pestered. I even dropped out of college twice and other studies (evening school) due to these psychological problems. I was a very good student and was always on top of my class (second, third). I even had 1% short to get high distinction (= 80%) the first year in college. Why am I telling you this? Because the second year, in september when school started again, I went back, got as far as the auditorium where the director of the school was going to give a speech and other BS. I was almost one food in the auditorium, turned around and never looked back. Never finished college. And this is due to all the psychological problems I had to go through when the entire world decided to bully me. Reason I dropped out; the first year a teacher told me that we had to make a presentation in the second year. That was enough for me to drop out of college. Standing in front of a crowd and addressing them, talking to them, scares the crap out of me. It still does. Stupid huh! :P

Before the age of 13, I was always to leader of the pack, so to speak.
But I still have one thing that never went away. I always have a fight reaction instead of a flight reaction.
But they broke me with real depressions as a result that started when I was in my early 20.

On top of that, I always had problems with anxiety from time to time. This had nothing to do with being bullied. It was also genetics in my case. I got it from my mother whom I lost due to suicide.
 
I can't believe that i'm thinking about this but...

1492672168474210374412.jpg


Life as an Arab, Muslim and bisexual is hard...Having abused and bullied in the childhood. Been dealing with Disorders such as ADHD and now depression, anxiety, loneliness and low self esteem. Been discriminated for one reason or another. Been sucking at some stuff and being rejected by everyone.

When this will end? Will it even be a bit better anytime soon?

I'm sorry for everything I have done wrong in this life. I love you all and I hope you have a great life. Im not sure if I even want to continue this struggle.
 
I still think it's a dangerous thing, trying to come up with a diagnosis through the internet.

What if the information on the internet is wrong?
What if you give somebody this wrong information to easy somebodies mind?

If one doesn't have a medical degree, nobody can make a diagnosis correctly just by looking up all the crap and wrong information that is on the internet. Everybody can write stuff on the internet and even pretend to be a doctor/psychiatrist. No, the only person I trust are the one whom have a medical degree. And even they can be wrong.

What I'm trying to say is that even medical people can be wrong. This is even more true for the internet.

I don't even trust doctors. I trust only myself. But I do take what doctors say with less salt than what some stranger on the internet thinks. Which is when the salt is required by the truckloads...
 
TB
Because a decade of training is EASILY offset but a quick 3 minute Google session.

No. Because 3 decades of theory doesn't translate into 3 decades of experience. And it never will.

Only an ignorant fool would think it does.
 
Trust your gut. Ever heard of it?

NNNjaEdit: Enlighten me.

I can't believe that i'm thinking about this but...

View attachment 642396

Life as an Arab, Muslim and bisexual is hard...Having abused and bullied in the childhood. Been dealing with Disorders such as ADHD and now depression, anxiety, loneliness and low self esteem. Been discriminated for one reason or another. Been sucking at some stuff and being rejected by everyone.

When this will end? Will it even be a bit better anytime soon?

I'm sorry for everything I have done wrong in this life. I love you all and I hope you have a great life. Im not sure if I even want to continue this struggle.

Hey dude, it's pretty tough where you live, I suggest you looks for some good local friends. They'll teach you thier ways to get through the harsh times. And to show you how good life can be with the correct choices. Best of luck ;)👍
 
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TB
Trusting your gut will work wonders when you've got polyps sprouting on your color or, god forbid, a child with genetic health issues, I'm sure.

But I'm betting that's just because I'm an ignorant fool.

Hmm..I guess you don't have heard the phrase before. Weird since everyone I know probably does.

Hahahah

If you think you're an ignorant fool, that's your choice. I never implied such words. Nice joke.
 
Trust your gut. Ever heard of it?

Yeah, I can't wait to let my dad know he had it wrong ten years ago, when he didn't self-diagnose the early signs of what ended up being thyroid cancer. He went and talked to... get this... a medical professional. The audacity.

Thanks to that so obviously inexperienced person, I still have my father in my life.

If you think you're an ignorant fool, that's your choice. I never implied such words. Nice joke.

Literally not even an hour ago.

Hey dude, it's pretty tough where you live, I suggest you looks for some good local friends. They'll teach you thier ways to get through the harsh times. And to show you how good life can be with the correct choices. Best of luck ;)👍

:odd:

Oh yeah, and don't double post.
 
No. Because 3 decades of theory doesn't translate into 3 decades of experience. And it never will.

Only an ignorant fool would think it does.
Yet they already have tons more experience than you within that 3 decades they've been practicing, yet you'll throw that out the window and trust yourself. You, a person with absolutely no experience with any of it, at all, whatsoever. Anyone who just trusts their gut, and nothing else, is the ignorant fool in my opinion, especially if a person has a family/history with medical issues.

Just a very odd thing to say, especially considering you don't see or know half the stuff your body is doing just by looking at it.
 
Yeah, I can't wait to let my dad know he had it wrong ten years ago, when he didn't self-diagnose the early signs of what ended up being thyroid cancer. He went and talked to... get this... a medical professional. The audacity.

Thanks to that so obviously inexperienced person, I still have my father in my life.



Literally not even an hour ago.



:odd:

Oh yeah, and don't double post.

Yeah.... About that ignorant fool thing. Let me clear it up a bit.

IMO whoever thinks that is an ignorant fool. That's the difference you like to gloss over.

More importantly why should you get offended with what someone thinks about you?


I'll draw a paralell for ya, slip.

This lady I know, she had back pain so bad. No names. Doc said she wouldn't be able to walk. What did her dad do? Took her for vacation, to India. She went for a massage every day for two weeks.
She woke up black and blue for days. Then she came back. Told doc all the pain was virtually gone. Doc nearly had a heart attack even believing it, but he took a good look at her, she wasn't lying. That's my anecdote.

Ask me again about gut feeling? Or you going to spontaneously remember what it actually means?
 
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