Depressives Post Challenge Question – Day 19 – Why is my Ego so angry?

I have been told in no uncertain terms, through word and behavior, that I am less than. I have been asked to not speak and keep my thoughts and opinions to myself. I have been told that making conversation is why people avoid me.  Quietness is not negativity; it is trying to keep things in control like tears, pain, anger, frustration and despair.  Basically, there is an excuse for others’ callous attitudes and narrow thinking about mental illness.

My depression or anxiety (or any other mood disorder) is not an excuse for someone else’s bad behavior. That is the kind of ridicule, shame and stigma that prevents people from seeking and continuing help and medication. It is the kind of verbal abuse that sad and sensitive people believe in the world of fear that we tread.

People can see anything or anyone as negative, and if you think it is so, you will never be disappointed.

But we who masquerade, daily in public, are experts at keeping our cracks from showing.  We smile and flatter as we dance and patter like an old Vaudeville actor.

I try  not to hold on to the comments and negative thinking, but my brain obsesses and spins them around like the hamster trapped in her wheel.

If my self-esteem lies somewhere between loathing and non-existent, why do the things people do to me make my Ego so angry? Do you ever feel this way?

Depressives Post Challenge Question – Day 18 ~ do you filter your thoughts?

Whether it is because I am tired, or in pain, or tired of being in pain, I cannot be sure. Sometimes, things come out of my mouth that are too snarky or too negative.  Then, because I obsess and have GAD and panic attacks, I worry about what I said for H O U R S. Then I feel guilty, shoot off more cortisol in the brain and glucose in the body….  Meanwhile the other person probably does not even give a sh*t because they don’t care about me to begin with and know how to brush off comments that they don’t care about.

I do not have that magic filter.  Seeing and feeling things so much, I want to express the truth. It is so simple and right in front of me.  It is too much pressure to be a nice person, a depressed person, and an anxious person all at the same time.

Do you say things and then regret them? Does it seem like your brain just ejected the thoughts as they occur?

Depressives Post Challenge Question – Day 17 ~ Have you ever been desperate to get to sleep?

Despite everything I take before I go to bed, I still cannot sleep as my brain does not stop. I am overtired but cannot get a good night’s sleep and wake up tired.

Sadly, I can understand being so desperate to get a solid sleep!

 

Do you ever feel that you just cannot shut down your brain and body?

How far would you go to get a good night’s sleep?   Do you have any good ideas for getting a good night’s sleep?

Depressives Post Challenge Question – Day 16 – Does your brain look or feel like this?

Depressives Post Challenge Question – Day 15 ~ Do you prefer the road less traveled?

As someone with a mood disorder, I recognize it when I see the anger in someone else. Also, the changeable moods of someone around me who is short-tempered, swearing and then crying, lets me know that I am dealing with someone struggling with a challenge that is not being addressed publicly.

We recognize symptoms, voice, tone, inflection, facial and body movements. We may be depressed but we are actually pretty astute.  For me, researching and reading is part of how I process my diagnosis. Also, the hypervigilance to make sure I am not getting worse, means I pay attention to E V E R Y T H I N G !

I know more than many people and can definitely keep up in any technical conversation with a doctor, psychiatrist or therapist.  Learning is learning for me; what makes up my depression, triggers, brain function and chemistry, comfort, reactions to medications, others’ experiences are all part of the things that I read about. I own many books and would never think of getting rid of them.

Of course, there are plenty of people who don’t want to face it or hear about it from me. They would like me to experience my panic attacks and anxiety in silence.

Do you like to research and read about your diagnosis or would you prefer to create a clear, untried path to understanding?

One of those annoying quotes about happiness and the joy of contrast

Bring Back My Happiness (Photo credit: Wikipedia)

In order to have great happiness you have to have great pain and unhappiness - otherwise how would you know when you're happy? ~Leslie Caron

in that case, I ought to be bloody giddy!

Depressives Post Challenge Question – Day 14 ~ Are you Singing the Sunday Blues?

Being anxious and depressed makes me hyperaware and hypervigilant about my symptoms. My brain is on overdrive even when my body is weighted down with concrete.

I thought that I was the only one who was most depressed on Sundays. Then before I considered adding a post, I decided to do a brief bit of research on this subject. Dr. Andrew Weil, M.D. discusses the “Sunday Night Blues” on his website.

Symptoms can range from a vague sense of uneasiness to full blown panic attacks. The condition? “Sunday neurosis,” increasingly known by the more casual term “Sunday night blues.” The former term was coined by Austrian psychotherapist Victor Frankl in 1946, suggesting this problem is far from new. The names may vary, but all of them describe the negative feelings – including anxiety, dread or plain sadness – that can accompany the knowledge that you’ll return to a difficult or stressful job on Monday.

The Sunday night blues have probably existed in some form since the start of the five-day workweek, which became institutionalized in the U.S. in 1926, after Henry Ford began shutting down his automotive factories on Saturday and Sunday. Now, science is confirming the phenomenon. In a November, 2009 paper, German and Swedish researchers said surveys of 12,000 individuals confirmed that Sundays are the least happy day for most people, while Fridays are the happiest.

Because it is not a formal condition recognized by any medical or psychological authority, there are no precise figures on the incidence of Sunday blues. But a British study reported in The Observer newspaper found that 26 percent of workers questioned felt dread and apprehension on the day they were due to return to work. Researchers speculated that the recession – which has led to increased job insecurity, and more burdensome workloads on those who remain employed – appears to be increasing such fears.

I thought that I was compartmentalizing, because I cannot show my depression at work, and therefore it came out on Sunday. I find that Sunday I am absolutely exhausted, don’t want to get dressed, am so lethargic that I avoid social contact….Who knew!?? Yes, it is true that I have GAD and it does get sky high on Sunday night. But instead of labeling it as a reaction that is practically normal to returning to a stressful work environment, I blame myself and think it is the depression winning the battle of the self.

Do you suffer from more anxiety, stressful and depressive symptoms on Sundays?

Depressives Post Challenge Question – Day 13

As someone created with many active pathways in the limbic system, my thoughts go round and round. Conversations and what-if conversations loop the loop in my imagination. But each hurt reverberates too.

This empathy and self awareness makes me want to reach out to others and communicate and educate the reality that many with a mood disorder face from those who choose to turn a blind eye. Then there are the bullies who verbally abuse someone who tries to be brave about their diagnosis.

The number of people suffering goes up daily and crosses so many other diagnoses that the brain chemistry tangles further and the solution, or mere attempts at controlling, can get lost in the haze of ordinary life.

Has being depressed, or suffering a mood disorder, made you more empathetic to others or hide deeper out of fear or anxiety?

Depressives Post Challenge Question – Day 12

I have had major depressive episodes. I took a unipolar antidepressant for 15 years. Then, I became manic on a unipolar antidepressant (Effexor). Instead of listening to my cries, my doctor continued to increase the dosage. He actually had the nerve to say to me “If you don’t stop crying, you will end up in a hospital.”

Well, to detox and get help from the damage that the b@stard created in my hypersensitive brain, I ultimately ended up checking myself into a hospital.

The hard part is remembering every single thing that occurred. I have not forgotten my experiences of the dangerous desperate lows and the bizarre sparkle dust of mania. It shames me and humiliates me.

The hard part was that it was not overnight and I have been reminded by coworkers and family. It was a nightmare and so horrifying that all these years later, trying to stay on meds and reading more books than a self-help section at the local book store, I cringe. People have had to leave jobs depending on the meltdown. Others, like myself, have had to deal with the look and treatment of the “crazy person” on the loose. It is hard enough to struggle mightily but having it rubbed in my face is excruciating.

Was your meltdown public and do people keep reminding you of their interpretation of it?

Depressives Post Challenge Question ~ Day 11

I have never had the “I think I am having a heart attack” type of panic attack. The anxiety builds and begins before I have even begun my trigger scenarios. For example, the anxiety thrums the day before having to get on a plane. The anxiety continues to build throughout the drive to and waiting in the lounge. I become snappish and short tempered and freaked out. Then I get on the plane. If there is the slightest chop or turbulence, all of my bodily systems, the sirens in my brain, the overshooting of adrenaline receptors —– all goes out of control, raging, screaming and I want to get off of the plane now. Let. Me. Out.

I have begun to have the same problem on highways. Is it a PTSD reaction to two previous major car accidents? I don’t know. But when that panic builds, I must pull over. Immediately. Wherever I am on the highway, the panic shrieks in my brain and crowds out any rational thought or clear breathing and I must pull off to the right and onto the shoulder. I cannot drive in the left lane and come back over because the panic attack is in massive high alert and I am brain-paralyzed. I must pull over. somewhere. right now. this instant.

A stewardess (insert whatever the politically correct terminology is here) semi rolled her eyes at me and said “Why don’t you take a Xanax?” Hmmmm, why didn’t I think of that. Oh yeah. MY DAMN DOCTOR WON’T GIVE ME ANY.

My fear and overwhelming panic feels very real and there is no question that the brain chemicals flying and frying my brain cannot be as bad as sugar, caffeine and all the other supposedly unhealthy things I am doing.

Do you suffer from panic attacks, and if so, what triggers cause them?