Tag: sad

A Little Lost

~ Sue ~ Leave a comment

This time of year is one where people often complain that they don’t know what day it is. This is mostly due to the festive period being a time where a lot of people are off work. It’s perfectly normal.

There is also this feeling of feeling in between two different emotions. Christmas is a time to show thanks, be grateful for what you have. And New Year is about looking forward to the future, step away from where you currently may be. Or that is how it has felt for me.

The festive period has been really difficult this year, due to a family loss. It has left me between being thankful for what I have, and wanting to move on. I am glad that there is people around, friends and family. But I also am afraid that stepping forward will lessen the memories I have. Honestly, I think every person feels like this with a loss, but Christmas just seems to exaggerate these feelings.

So, I feel like I am sitting in limbo. Time forces me forward, despite my wishes. It doesn’t matter whether I am ready, things move on. Doesn’t make things any easier though.

Social Media Care

~ Sue ~ Leave a comment

I remember when I started using social media, many years ago (in fact, 10 years ago), it was a place of excitement. It was new for everyone, it was filled with normal folk, as advertisers hadn’t really jumped on the bandwagon yet. Social media became a place of freedom of expression. Unfortunately, for a lot of people, this isn’t the case anymore. No matter what you express, it feels like there are always people about to try and pick holes in what you say. Like, I try to be kind and advice-like when I write, but people like to jump on what I say to be all ’that isn’t how it is to me, so you are lying’. And these people are usually anonymous profiles who seem to spend all their time hating other people.

It is important to look after yourself in an atmosphere that can be so destructive. So, I thought up I few things that I use, when social media gets to me.

1) Block button. Every social media site has the ability to mute or block certain users. This is good. You might have a friend who is posting annoying rubbish for a TV show you hate, you can mute them for a while. This means, you are still following them, but you don’t see their content for a while. Blocking means that the person is unfollowed, can’t see what you post or anything on your profile. This is a good way to cut out people who may be harassing you.

2)Take time out. Go for a day or so without social media. I usually simply put my phone on airplane mode for a few hours, like when I am studying, so that I can focus without the constant pinging of my phone. If that isn’t enough, and you want a few days away from the distraction of your Facebook timeline, delete the app from your most used device. A lot of the time, we check social media constantly because it always seems to be there. And it not being there, can free up a lot of time.

3)Don’t read bad comments. Sometimes, you could post a picture of an apple on Instagram, and it would attract bad comments. If you see this happening, try not to feel down. These people seem to get some kind of thrill of bringing people down. You can disable comments on many social media services, as well as make it so only your friends can comment. You will find that people are a lot less confrontational if they know you, or have to share their identity.

4) Just laugh. Try not to take social media too seriously. A lot of the content that you will be shown on sites like Facebook and Twitter are there to get a reaction. So they will either be content you agree with, or content you massively disagree with. For example, I would say I am ’left-leaning’ when it comes to politics, so the stuff I get shown is either supporting that stance, or is wildly opposing those views. So, try not to take everything as gospel, and just laugh when people do. It also can defuse a situation building up within yourself, as laughter does make you feel better.

5) Be kind to yourself. If you find anything on social media to be causing any kind of negative reaction to yourself, then step away. You are the only you there is, so it’s important you look after yourself. If there is too much BS happening, then go and read a book, play a computer game or whatever social media is distracting you from.

You can be selective over what you show on social media, and it’s important to remember that. Because everyone else is too. A lot of people show part of themselves, whether it be a nice or a nasty side. So if someone attacks you, then remember it is just what they think they see, it’s not actually you.

Head In Sand

~ Sue ~ Leave a comment

Recently I haven’t been sharing at all. Which is not like me, but it’s hard when you are dealing with something that you’d rather not be dealing with.

Unfortunately, life is not that kind. I have been sick, had a major crash with my mental health, had course work due in and the busiest time of the year for the ol’ day job. And it all kind of left me functioning, but that was it. I didn’t want to talk about it, still don’t, because I didn’t want to think about how much stuff was happening all at once. It’s kind of calmed down a little, my coursework is done and Christmas is a week a way, which means no overtime. And it’s allowing me a little time to reflect on why I burrowed myself away from the internet.

For years the internet was where I could let my feelings go, where I could write about stuff that no one cared about. It was very therapeutic and it was completely disconnected from my real life. However, every day there seems to be more merging of both my private life and the one I talk about on line. People who I know in real life, are able to access what I am writing.

Now, this doesn’t seem like a huge problem for some, as they see things being made public, and surely it doesn’t matter who reads it. But… that’s not really how it goes. In my life, I try to put a smile on as I soldier on through whatever the day throws at me. Inside, I may be falling apart, but I don’t want people to see it. I always feel like my mental health issues makes me a burden on others, so I don’t want them to know. That way people don’t feel pressured into being nice, they are being nice because they want to, not because I’m not right in the head. And when these people I share my daily life with can read what I really feel, I feel like I have let them down. I mean, surely I should be able to talk to folk, right?

So, sometimes it is easier to bury my head in the sand. Pretend things are okay, when they aren’t. It’s not perfect. But, it can get me through times where I don’t have the strength to deal with questions about things that I don’t know how to put into words. That’s what writing helps me do, sometimes, put what’s in my head into words that (kind of) make sense.

Cancelled

~ Sue ~ Leave a comment

I have tried to be honest when I write on here. And it has proven to be something very helpful when dealling with my mental health. Because I find it difficult to speak to people about what I am going through, writing into the void seems a lot easier for me. It,unfortunately, doesn’t mean things become easier to handle.

One of the managers from my work is leaving, and people had organised a nightout for him. I was working all day, when this was happening. But, I thought that I might turn up for a bit, and at least buy the guy a beer and wish him luck. Seemed like a good plan, I’d just go up after work, stay for a few hours, stick to soft drinks and drive myself home. It seemed like a good plan. But then, anxiety happened. I knew everyone who was going to be there, I knew the pub, it wasn’t a big deal. There is no telling my brain that, when it starts getting ahead of itself though. I had a panic attack. I ended up struggling to breathe and crying over nothing. In my car. Like an idiot. I had been fine all day, I don’t know why I felt so bad all of a sudden. I decided to get some food and see if I felt better, but I ended up getting a migraine and going to bed early. I felt awful that I wasn’t able to go out. I am trying to go easier on myself, but it is hard.

I feel that I cancel a lot of plans these days, and it is hard. I feel like a constant let down, and it’s a horrible feeling. Like, how are you supposed to ‘be there’ for people, when you physically can’t be anywhere? It makes me feel like such a shit person. And that makes me want to stay locked up in solitary confinement even more. When I speak to people, or try to, I get told to stop over-thinking. I can’t help what I am thinking about, it isn’t like I consciously decide to over-react. That isn’t how it works.

I just wish I could find out how ‘it’ does work. Would make things a bit easier. At least I’d be able to explain it to the people I disappoint.

For Attention

~ Sue ~ Leave a comment

Have you heard ‘that’ retort, when you actually speak out about your mental health? The one that devalues every little thing that you feel. When someone says that you are ‘doing it for the attention’.

It is the most frustrating thing ever. A lot of the time, for myself anyway, if I am having some kind of anxiety attack, where ever I am, I don’t really need someone scoffing that I’m trying to get attention. It has happened a lot over the last few days. People point and prod at every little thing I do sometimes, and it does nothing but confirm what I am already thinking about myself. It is great.

It made me wonder, the thinks I would do if I wanted attention? I’d probably sing whilst walking to work. Get in people’s way at work. Upload every thought, in a cryptic manner, on Facebook. Shout and make a lot of noise at work, or out of work. But, I wouldn’t cry on the bus, or at Starbucks, or have a panic attack whilst walking down a street. I wouldn’t because it is horrifically embarrassing.

Every person who accuses a sufferer of mental health issues of attention seeking, are simply ignorant. They don’t know what it feels like to experience mental health. Lucky them.

 

Lone Ranger

~ Sue ~ 3 Comments

I like my own company. I go for lunch myself, I spend entire days were I don’t really speak to anyone else. It’s good for my mental health a lot of the time, because I can focus on what suits me. But sometimes, you need other people. You need someone to vent to as you fail at something for what feels like the hundredth time.

The problem is, that if people think you are used to being on your own, and pulling yourself through whatever shit life throws at you, they leave you alone. People assume that you are the way you are, because you want to be like that. That you don’t need help. Everything that I do, is something I do to help me cope. I listen to music loud on the bus, because I can panic when I am around that many people I don’t know. I do stuff that occupies my brain, as it stops me from thinking too much.

The more you spend on your own, the harder it gets to speak to people about problems. No one person can do everything on their own. It’s great being independent, but don’t be afraid to ask up. People may assume you are ‘fine’, the only way they’d know you aren’t, is if you tell them.

Standing Still

~ Sue ~ Leave a comment

I am getting really irritated about myself. I sometimes feel like I am making progress, with my mental health, but then just go backwards. It’s frustrating.

For example, last week was really positive. I was in a really good mood, which was helped by a quiet few days at work. So I had time to relax, catch up with friends and not working. Which is nice sometimes. However, this all ended by someone saying something negative to me. I feel really stupid, knowing that someone making a throwaway comment can effect me so much. It’s the kind of thing that makes me feel ashamed for feeling bad, and that I am a liability, and no one really needs to be around someone like that.

Thinking like this, is not nice. It is suffocating. Previously, I would just dwell on this feeling, and end up in a terrible state. Now, I try to reach out to people. Well, there is only a handful of people who I feel I can reach out to. This is not to be against people I know. If I feel bad, I feel like a burden. Which is how I tend to feel most the time. It is exhausting.

Afterwards, it is easy to say that any feelings of anxiety are irrational. But that doesn’t help that feeling of utter useless you get, when you are only barely treading water. It sometimes feels I am moving forward, only to come back to square one. But, when I do feel a bit better, I can think with slightly more optimism.

I may return to square 1 time after time, but maybe that square is moving further up the board as I go on. I mean I do know I am better than I even was last year. It is just unbelievably slow.

Lost Day

~ Sue ~ Leave a comment

Today is Sunday, and it is the worst I have felt in quite a while. It has come from nowhere, which is probably one of the more frustrating parts. I don’t really know where this feeling came from, the feeling of hopelessness, but it showed it’s face today.

I have heard before, that keeping busy can keep the problems of mental health at bay. Now, that is something that seems over-simplified, but there is an idea of truth in it. When I am working away, I can get anxious, but can kind of work through it. However, when there is nothing getting done, the bad thoughts come into play. I woke up this morning, around 10.30, with plans to get up and be busy. Make the best of my day off. But I just couldn’t pull myself out of bed. I just lay there. I dozed a little, but I mostly just felt crap.

When I am feeling like this, I kind of clamp up. I get stuck between contacting someone to distract me, and not doing anything so I  don’t ‘burden’ anyone. This reaction, is not new, its something that has been born out of years trying to deal with my mental health on my own. Something that shuts people out, because it is embarrassing that I am struggling with a life that is not actually that difficult.

Depression is vicious. It takes time. It needs understanding. But it sometimes gets neither. So I have to do it for myself. I have been having problems with depression most of my life, I can say that now, first started when i was 15, am now 32. Never spoke to anyone till I was in my 20s, I just needed to ‘grow up’. But physical growth does not equal mental growth, so nothing changed. I had to make it change. Which I have fought hard to do. A fight that so many people I know don’t know of, let alone acknowledge. I guess that is what mental health does. Makes so many people battle themselves in private, and nobody else knows of their debilitating pain.

Luckily for me, whilst I can’t tell people that I am having a bad spell, I can write it. It might not be the most grammatically correct,  but it is a release. It is easier to sit in front of my computer for an hour, typing away, than it is to sit in front of another person and explain what is ‘going on’. I have tried to speak to people before, been called selfish, self-centered, stupid, childish… all whilst they stare me down. Sometimes, negative commentary from others, actually reinforces what is going round in my head.

It’s complicated. And I hate it.

But sometimes, it is easier to say I am sick. People will accept stomach bugs without question, when I want to lie in bed all day.

Accomplished

~ Sue ~ Leave a comment

That is my Christmas organised. Everything is either already been given, or is sitting under the tree waiting to be opened. And it feels pretty great. 

Today, I heard people complain on how Christmas is stressful, and they wish they could cancel it. Christmas is one of the least stressful things, for me. I like the idea of finding a gift for a loved one, to let them know I care about them. It’s a bit of a ‘thank you’ for sticking by me for, yet another, disappointing year. And, as I get older, I am appreciating Christmas as the time I get to catch up with old friends, even just for a coffee. It’s that one time of the year, where everything seems to slow down and we can catch our breath.

However, there have been a few years not long past, where I did struggle at Christmas. Where in the run up, I felt lonely, despite being surrounded by people. I realise now, that the loneliness was something in my head, which at the time, only seemed to make me feel isolated. I faked my way through it though, to scared of letting anyone down any more than I needed to. That is not a good way for anybody to feel at any time of the year, but the festive period has a habit of exaggerating any feelings of negativity. 

My way through the bad feelings was to try and ignore them. And whilst it may have made the people around me oblivious, it made my mental health so much worse in the long run. 

So if you are feeling sad this Christmas please speak out. Your friends, family and colleagues do care about you, and may not try to help if you don’t say anything. They maybe don’t want to pry. But say you are finding things stressful, people will try and help you. 

If you feel like you have no one to talk to, there is always somewhere to turn at this particularly emotional time of year. Please visit http://www.samaritans.org or call 116 123 (UK & Ireland) for free and confidential help. 

Depression Diaries: Working Away

~ Sue ~ Leave a comment

Depression is a strange thing to live with. For weeks at a time you can be struggling to even get up in the morning. It never really lifts, but there are days where I can put up with it, and kind of work around it. Days where I feel as normal as I can get. When I don’t feel like crying at all through the day, where I can speak to people without wanting to crawl into a dark corner for wasting their time. But whatever I feel, I do my best to get up and go to work. It’s the one thing I try to promise myself, to go to work, and at least I have achieved something no matter how crap the day ends up. Though I have phoned in sick, it doesn’t happen very regularly.

I work in a warehouse, and by looking at my blog title and things you’d notice that wasn’t my plan. But, needs must, and at least I know I have regular income. Unfortunately, not everyone sees jobs like that. Some people have a snobbish look at jobs that they view as ‘below’ them. And I have people asking me why I’d bother working at a warehouse. They imply that for a person to work there means that there is something wrong with that person. It’s almost like they are saying that a person has to be ‘stupid’ to work in this warehouse, and be content.

This should be an easy comment to brush off, because why should someone else’s opinion matter? But it does. It’s another reason to feel to feel like a failure. Like, it is a basic job, anyone can do it. I don’t add anything to the job, and no one would notice if I wouldn’t go back. My brain goes into this spiral where my thoughts are just berating everything that I do and how everything is just a waste of time. And it is honestly horrible. I have this instilled thought that I just waste people’s time, so just end up spending time alone. And to think that even the medial task of working a basic job is worthless, it just makes me want to hide from everything.

I am writing this after taking some thinking time over how bad attitudes about my job make me feel. I have tried to look around the negative feelings, and find something a bit better. The conclusion that I came to was that everyone expects things to be done for them. Whether you visit a coffee shop for a Mocha or clear out your rubbish bin, there is someone there that makes things happen. Someone makes your coffee, and someone collects all the rubbish to take to refuge. Everything that happens in modern day life happens because someone makes it happen. Even when you do things online, someone makes that dress you order get to your door. People make things happen, and without the people doing the medial tasks, things wouldn’t happen. At all. Every job has a purpose, every person has a purpose. Maybe rather than tearing apart those around us, we should recognise that people do shitty jobs and there is no shame in it. I need to remember that sometime.