Depression

[andy-xr]

Nervasport said:

Thank you, you don't know what that means to me.

You're right. It wasn't easy to write. It forced me to have a long hard look at myself.

I've finally realised I need to stop fighting those who care for me and also stop fighting myself too, hopefully when my home purchase is completed I can rebuild myself.

Thank you jogger. And thank you PH, I hope we all come through the other end smiling..... Together

Edited by Nervasport on Thursday 3rd September 22:47

I went quite a few rounds with a psychotherapist for a time a few years ago, and also did a lot of acceptance and commitment therapy, which I found really good for me.

Shame isnt a good motivator, incase you fall into that one, it makes you feel worse about yourself and then brings guilt. Acceptance and moving past something, towards something else is a much better option, just need to work out what that is. Could be 'spend more time with XYZ' but it has to be something you control. There's no point having 'get John to forgive me' as a tick list because they never might. 'Ask John for forgiveness' is OK, you can do that, it's up to him if he offers it. As an example of course.

I''m very into having directions rather than goals or objectives, because directions change the way you do life in general. Objectives and goals are really short term (long term ones are hard and it's easy to give up on them)

If your goal is 'spend 5 hours reading' and you only have time for 3, you'll blame yourself for fking around for 2 hours somewhere else. If your direction is 'I fancy reading this book, and then that one' then it's easier to get to grips with. You can do it when and how you want rather than clockwatching and checking if you've done enough. You could substitute book reading for whatever fits in, meeting people, spending time doing things for others, for you etc

[Nervasport]

Chicken Chaser said:

Nervasport, would a reconciliation be something that you are striving towards or are you looking to open a new chapter?

I'm not quite sure what I want. However with that being said just want to feel normal again.
When I was doing my mortgage application and they did the life cover and question such as Over the last 5 years have you had depression, I answered no purely because I was too ashamed to say yes and to appear normal.

Think it's time to get back on the saddle and get this bd out of me. I wouldn't wish this upon my worst enemy.

[Ruskie]

Nervasport said:

Hi all its been a while....

basically its coming up to my step sons memorial (his death is my trigger for this horrible illness) and after listening to the radio last night where they were discussing depression, I thought I'd try put into words how this is affecting me and try to make sense of things.

It'll be 3 years on October 18th my step son passed on due to health problems at the very young age of 2 years and a week off his third birthday. I understand he's died but what I can't understand is why? why does anyone die? My brain keeps telling me something happened but I'm reluctant to accept it...

When that happened I had literally thrown myself into working every hour God sent to try block it out, meanwhile as I was doing this I was trying to run a house single handedly as Mrs nervasport was quite understandably in a world of hurt too and had became withdrawn so I plodded on to try get back to normal.

What shocked me next was a month after his passing was that little nervasport was going to make an appearance in 9 months time which threw extra stress on me. Having a little one on the way made me feel on constant edge after what had happened with him.

Anyway... Fast forward to December and I think that's when it had hit me I'd became depressed, I'd become a shadow of my former self. Grief, pregnancy, money worries and the rest which were getting on top of me. I tried to tell Mrs nervasport but she didn't want to know, our relationship since then has been pretty st, it became a toxic environment and over time grew to resent one another.

When I hit my lowest of lows i used to think to myself when I was driving by myself 'that would be a great place to crash and end it all' but thankfully I didn't.

We stayed together for the sake of little nervasport and in July 2013 she made an appearance and everything seemed ok. But when his first memorial was approaching i went into meltdown and didn't want to see or speak to anyone for God knows how long.

When her father had invited us to a family bbq, I was raring to go out and try get back to being me but I don't know why but I just lost it again and curled up and cried and stayed home, I felt ashamed to be depressed, I didn't think it would happen to me but it has.

I've had counselling but she stopped contacting me and hasn't got back to me since September last year.... And feel a bit st for not being able to see it through.

The past few years have been turbulent to say the least.

Me and Mrs nervasport now live apart for the sake of little nervasport so she didn't see us fighting everyday as she doesn't need to see that and well we get on better now and that's half the battle I suppose and my daughter brings absolute joy to my life. If it wasn't for her I'd probably be pushing up daisies.

I do think of my stepson everyday but those memories I had of him have been replaced by him in that hospice room drugged up to the eyeballs on morphine and having to watch him die.

It is hard to put into words how I feel now as I simply don't know..... Probably empty is the best word I guess.


I hadn't realised how much of a bd I had been to people until last night..... The radio presenter was describing everything I am today, miserable, bitter, resentful, confused to name but a few. I wish i wasn't like this but I am. I don't think I'll ever be the same again.

I'm sorry if none of this makes sense and might think its just rambling but this feels sort of better to actually be able to look at it and think how to get myself out of it.

Edited by Nervasport on Thursday 3rd September 13:37

Well done on getting it out there and writing it down. I know how hard that is to do and I could empathise with a lot of what you are saying especially your last paragraph.

[Ruskie]

I have been quiet lately but it's there stalking me. I'm on the brink of a crippling down period. This is my first blog for a month. The catalyst is insomnia and rejection.

As always I really appreciate any feedback and interaction, good or bad.

https://howfootballruinedmylife.wordpress.com/2015...

[Nervasport]

Very sobering. Is there anyone you can talk to ? Maybe even vent at?

[Ruskie]

Nervasport said:

Very sobering. Is there anyone you can talk to ? Maybe even vent at?

To be honest I just want to be alone in bed. Phone is going off and I'm withdrawing. Bad? Probably but I want to do it. I don't want contact with anyone.

[Ruskie]

Reality. I'm getting really good at this depression thing.

https://howfootballruinedmylife.wordpress.com/2015...

[throt]

Ruskie and Tonyvid,

From what I have read I would blame 80% of your depression on both of your relationships breakdown.

I read, "soulmate" , "wanting to be held" and "eggs in one basket", among more, theses were all in relation to your X's.

Have you guys talked to specialist on these subjects, these seem the main issues for you two.

All the very best guys...

[Ruskie]

throt said:

Ruskie and Tonyvid,

From what I have read I would blame 80% of your depression on both of your relationships breakdown.

I read, "soulmate" , "wanting to be held" and "eggs in one basket", among more, theses were all in relation to your X's.

Have you guys talked to specialist on these subjects, these seem the main issues for you two.

All the very best guys...

That's just my feelings currently. My depression started long before the relationship problems.

[tonyvid]

throt said:

Ruskie and Tonyvid,

From what I have read I would blame 80% of your depression on both of your relationships breakdown.

I read, "soulmate" , "wanting to be held" and "eggs in one basket", among more, theses were all in relation to your X's.

Have you guys talked to specialist on these subjects, these seem the main issues for you two.

All the very best guys...

That's a good observation and largly true. I did have a period in the late 90s of being depressed for a couple of years and was still very happily married at the time. I think that was as the result of being under the constant threat of redundancy for about 6 years which was enormously stressful. Most of the team I worked with had been made redundent over that time so I felt very isolated at work and they were also part of my social circle which got dispanded when they all left.

In recent years it as been directly linked to relationship breakdowns - the first in 2006/7 when my wife wanted to split up, I moved out and onto divorce. Again, practically all the social circle went as well as they were all joint friends who were more closly linked to her. Most recently it has been almost directly linked to the breakup with my longterm partner. The world just falls in.

Something similar happened last year for a couple of weeks(I'll not bore you), but it was quickly resolved and my massive feelings of crisis/anxiety/loss/scared/vunerable/fill your own gaps stopped almost instantly! It was like a switch. I do seem to then have a real downer about 6-8weeks after a big stessful event and this lingered on for a number of months. Last year really was terrible with work for months and the blip immediately afterwards.

So yes, there is something about the way I am so vunerable to a breakup. If I only get half emotionly involved to protect myself it almost guarentees the realtionship will fail, if I go in feet first all my eggs are in that basket. I need to find a better way of doing this, with a lot more social life and support of my own, I logically know all that. But at 50ish it's hard for an old dog to learn new tricks and I really don't know where to start. Very sad really.

I will see what happens over the next few weeks - we do have a company funded counselling service so I will look into that as, one way or the other, I cannot carry on like this now or everytime

[tonyvid]

I was supposed to be meeting her on Wednesday at a local forest for a coffee, chat, stroll etc....and she's sent me a message with 2 excuses why she can't make it....maybe next week....

I'm so fkING angry at the moment, she knew this was important to me. I'm absolutely fking furious. Took the dog out and then went for a hard bike ride to try and burn off some of the flight before fight set in

I half knew she would do this and yet it still hits like a body blow. I'm so angry I've not dared reply and it's probably best not to anyway. Her mum has just found out her step dad wants a divorce so I understand that she needs to support her with a meeting at the solicitors but to my mind 2 excuses is one too many to ring true. I understand that she might be finding the thought of meeting on weds as difficult but I feel she's stringing me along as it's too hard to just say no.

I don't know what to think right now about any of it but I'm so upset and angry when I was hoping to be looking forward.

Sorry for the ramble but it needs to get out

[Ruskie]

https://howfootballruinedmylife.wordpress.com/2015...

Bits. In total bits.

To those who have sent me personal messages I will reply I due course. Thanks a lot.

[227bhp]

tonyvid said:

I was supposed to be meeting her on Wednesday at a local forest for a coffee, chat, stroll etc....and she's sent me a message with 2 excuses why she can't make it....maybe next week....

I'm so fkING angry at the moment, she knew this was important to me. I'm absolutely fking furious. Took the dog out and then went for a hard bike ride to try and burn off some of the flight before fight set in

I half knew she would do this and yet it still hits like a body blow. I'm so angry I've not dared reply and it's probably best not to anyway. Her mum has just found out her step dad wants a divorce so I understand that she needs to support her with a meeting at the solicitors but to my mind 2 excuses is one too many to ring true. I understand that she might be finding the thought of meeting on weds as difficult but I feel she's stringing me along as it's too hard to just say no.

I don't know what to think right now about any of it but I'm so upset and angry when I was hoping to be looking forward.

Sorry for the ramble but it needs to get out

A bit of the story seems to have gone missing as you don't say who 'she' is....
It seems to me that you have identified what you need to do and where you are going wrong, but not actually doing anything about it, whilst ever you do the same things over and over again, the outcomes will remain the same.

[drivin_me_nuts]

tonyvid said:

throt said:

Ruskie and Tonyvid,

From what I have read I would blame 80% of your depression on both of your relationships breakdown.

I read, "soulmate" , "wanting to be held" and "eggs in one basket", among more, theses were all in relation to your X's.

Have you guys talked to specialist on these subjects, these seem the main issues for you two.

All the very best guys...

That's a good observation and largly true. I did have a period in the late 90s of being depressed for a couple of years and was still very happily married at the time. I think that was as the result of being under the constant threat of redundancy for about 6 years which was enormously stressful. Most of the team I worked with had been made redundent over that time so I felt very isolated at work and they were also part of my social circle which got dispanded when they all left.

In recent years it as been directly linked to relationship breakdowns - the first in 2006/7 when my wife wanted to split up, I moved out and onto divorce. Again, practically all the social circle went as well as they were all joint friends who were more closly linked to her. Most recently it has been almost directly linked to the breakup with my longterm partner. The world just falls in.

Something similar happened last year for a couple of weeks(I'll not bore you), but it was quickly resolved and my massive feelings of crisis/anxiety/loss/scared/vunerable/fill your own gaps stopped almost instantly! It was like a switch. I do seem to then have a real downer about 6-8weeks after a big stessful event and this lingered on for a number of months. Last year really was terrible with work for months and the blip immediately afterwards.

So yes, there is something about the way I am so vunerable to a breakup. If I only get half emotionly involved to protect myself it almost guarentees the realtionship will fail, if I go in feet first all my eggs are in that basket. I need to find a better way of doing this, with a lot more social life and support of my own, I logically know all that. But at 50ish it's hard for an old dog to learn new tricks and I really don't know where to start. Very sad really.

I will see what happens over the next few weeks - we do have a company funded counselling service so I will look into that as, one way or the other, I cannot carry on like this now or everytime

Partners leaving, marriages ending, relationships breaking down, when they are so important, their loss is near as dammit the same as when you go through bereavement. Perhaps, more than depression itself, what you are dealing with is the bereavement and all that that brings. I was depressed to when my wife died and even now, as I type this, I could so easily reconnect with those emotions surrounding it.

Perhaps in order to move life forwards, you have to deal first with the loss you feel, and in your situation, it seems to be two losses and not just one.

On top of that, the stress and uncertainty of redundancy adds a potent mix to this that has compounded all that you feel.

You write as if you are in the depths of grief. Perhaps, the journey of your life moving forwards, is to start with addressing that.

All the best,

DMN

[throt]

drivin_me_nuts said:

tonyvid said:

throt said:

Ruskie and Tonyvid,

From what I have read I would blame 80% of your depression on both of your relationships breakdown.

I read, "soulmate" , "wanting to be held" and "eggs in one basket", among more, theses were all in relation to your X's.

Have you guys talked to specialist on these subjects, these seem the main issues for you two.

All the very best guys...

That's a good observation and largly true. I did have a period in the late 90s of being depressed for a couple of years and was still very happily married at the time. I think that was as the result of being under the constant threat of redundancy for about 6 years which was enormously stressful. Most of the team I worked with had been made redundent over that time so I felt very isolated at work and they were also part of my social circle which got dispanded when they all left.

In recent years it as been directly linked to relationship breakdowns - the first in 2006/7 when my wife wanted to split up, I moved out and onto divorce. Again, practically all the social circle went as well as they were all joint friends who were more closly linked to her. Most recently it has been almost directly linked to the breakup with my longterm partner. The world just falls in.

Something similar happened last year for a couple of weeks(I'll not bore you), but it was quickly resolved and my massive feelings of crisis/anxiety/loss/scared/vunerable/fill your own gaps stopped almost instantly! It was like a switch. I do seem to then have a real downer about 6-8weeks after a big stessful event and this lingered on for a number of months. Last year really was terrible with work for months and the blip immediately afterwards.

So yes, there is something about the way I am so vunerable to a breakup. If I only get half emotionly involved to protect myself it almost guarentees the realtionship will fail, if I go in feet first all my eggs are in that basket. I need to find a better way of doing this, with a lot more social life and support of my own, I logically know all that. But at 50ish it's hard for an old dog to learn new tricks and I really don't know where to start. Very sad really.

I will see what happens over the next few weeks - we do have a company funded counselling service so I will look into that as, one way or the other, I cannot carry on like this now or everytime

Partners leaving, marriages ending, relationships breaking down, when they are so important, their loss is near as dammit the same as when you go through bereavement. Perhaps, more than depression itself, what you are dealing with is the bereavement and all that that brings. I was depressed to when my wife died and even now, as I type this, I could so easily reconnect with those emotions surrounding it.


All the best,

DMN

Exactly, DMN,

I think Ruskie and Tony have got the ""double whammy"" effect. You just need that one thing to trigger a negative mindset and all the other little niggles you have in life become much larger. When you have your "soulmate' though, those niggles are somewhat diluted.

Then you have sensitivity factors which differ between everyone, some are just more sensitive than the other one, our Tony full's in to this category.

Also, life in general is hard now and very stressful and the one thing that is a put now is a demanding partner, and I mean demanding in all aspects, such as, possessiveness, jealousy and even poor health, which can and will challenge a relationship. I think both parties of a relationship need to keep it relaxed and trustful, without trust it all becomes tedious and tiresome and thats when it goes bang and over.

As I say, all the best to all the above with depression and other problems. I think millions suffer in silent with some kind of mental disorder, so nobody is alone.

[maxxy5]

In my experience, depression, at a simple level, is (irrational) self-hate. I know it doesn't seem irrational, because your brain comes up with lots of logical reasons - like your recent blog post ruskie with the song lyric that runs through this 'evidence' of you being a bad person. I totally recognise the pattern and how hard it is to reverse once your emotions are set in motion.

What I am working on personally (I wouldn't call this advice!): Be kind to yourself and redevelop an ego, 'love youself' (*) practice (as in training) positive emotions towards yourself and others instead of negative depressed ones. The brain responds to this training. Depression is an emotion. Develop emotional independence so setbacks dont trigger the negative thought cycle and you're not 100% dependent on others or obsessed with what others think.

I still don't know if it's placebo or bks but I have found hypnosis videos for depression and guided imagery helps with this positive self image. YouTube it. Or I'm sure a proper therapist will do it better.

Having said that I now don't believe anyone can help me but myself, which I find quite empowering.

Edited by maxxy5 on Wednesday 9th September 00:38

• this is all very un-british, which I think has been half the problem, we're not supposed to like ourselves...

Edited by maxxy5 on Wednesday 9th September 00:41

[tonyvid]

Sorry for not replying straight away, I am reading it all and taking it in. My head is so rammed with all this emotion I can't think straight enought to answer properly

227bhp said:

A bit of the story seems to have gone missing as you don't say who 'she' is....
It seems to me that you have identified what you need to do and where you are going wrong, but not actually doing anything about it, whilst ever you do the same things over and over again, the outcomes will remain the same.

"She" is my partner of 6 years who told me she didn't want to carry on the way we were etc and then just left. We have been in contact, daily, but only via Whatsap and I am starting to dread that ping as it's rarely something in my favour(neutral, not really responding or another let down). We were supposed to be meeting today but it's not happened and now I'm waiting again for her to say when we can. I'm not prepared to let it go as I think we have a chance if only we can start talking properly again. I might be delusional, she might not be able to say to me that it's completely finished but this constant state of purgatory is just bloody awful.

In terms of knowing what I need to do to make it better for ME long term, I do know that but I guess we are all guilty of living the happy bit when we are actually happy and ignoring the things that can wound us from past experience and knowledge. Only a fool doesn't learn from their mistakes...or people who are so busy and also happy they can forget the hurt as they think it will all be ok if they don't think it might not be again. Head-Sand...

drivin_me_nuts said:

Partners leaving, marriages ending, relationships breaking down, when they are so important, their loss is near as dammit the same as when you go through bereavement. Perhaps, more than depression itself, what you are dealing with is the bereavement and all that that brings. I was depressed to when my wife died and even now, as I type this, I could so easily reconnect with those emotions surrounding it.

Perhaps in order to move life forwards, you have to deal first with the loss you feel, and in your situation, it seems to be two losses and not just one.

On top of that, the stress and uncertainty of redundancy adds a potent mix to this that has compounded all that you feel.

You write as if you are in the depths of grief. Perhaps, the journey of your life moving forwards, is to start with addressing that.

All the best,

DMN

DMN always has such insight and I thank you all for the time and thoughts you put into these replies

Spot on, it is a form of grieving but....they are also still there along with that chance it might be resolvable. It's back to this purgatory thing again. The very last thing I want to hear from her is "not going to happen so fk off and don't bother me" but I keep trying to keep the communication going to drag it back from the brink and it's very tough.

I know you are all thinking - give it up, millions more out there etc but when you truly love someone(and they are still walking)it's not so easy.

I've not had the heartbreak of someone dying like DMN had with the lady he so obvioulsy loved to bits(and I did follow every single day of that ) People are left by someone who has no choice, massively hard as that is, and I really have no idea. I also think it's incredibly hard when someone deals you the same effective result but its based purely on the fact that they don't want ME and I find that impoosible hard to deal with personally. I'm pleased I'm in the office on my own right now as tears are running down my face to just write that out.

Ruskie's blog is blocked through work but I did read the last couple of entries last night. I can 100% undestand and empathsis with his relationship issues and how it make him feel. You are not alone buddy.

I'm going to stop now, it's all upsetting me more on an already upset day whenI was hoping to be strolling a forest and looking for a future.

[andy-xr]

Tony, here's what I see. I work visually so this might be a bit 'out there' but see if you can catch it.

You've taken your 'good' emotions, things like happiness, comfort, enjoyment, hope and laughter, threaded them onto a necklace and given them to someone else who's gone off somewhere still wearing them.

You've taken your 'bad' emotions, things like sadness, anger, despair and unhappiness, squashed them into a ball and threaded that onto a chain that you're dragging around tied to your ankle.

You've no control over your 'good' feelings and emotions while they're being held captive by someone else. And you're completely reliant on someone else giving you morsels of them for you to enjoy balance in your life. You've got to either give them away and get new ones or take them back under your control.

Wear both of them yourself. What can you actually control in this relationship? Figure that out (I know, it's hard) and you'll go a long way to gaining control over these things that are way out of your grasp right now. I can tell you, hoping for a WhatsApp message that's giving a green light and only then can you be happy is a surefire way of kicking yourself in the knackers. You're completely reliant on them. What you've got more of a grasp of is whether you're bothered about receiving a WhatsApp message. Whether whatever is inside it is going to make you cry or laugh. Whether you can still do whatever it is you want to do on your own, for yourself

I'll put it another way, the way it was explained to me. There's a chess match going on in your head. Pieces are being strewn around, the black knight has landed on a white pawn and splinters are being torn off it. You're in this battle whether you like it or not.

Which part are you? For many people they want to back the white pieces, white is good, white = happiness, serenity, the good life. Black is the baddies, the druggies, the nasty thoughts and feelings.

What if actually you're the chessboard. The board doesnt care if white or black wins. It doesnt matter if pieces get hacked to bits, it moves on to the next game just looking at what's being played out, then gets back to doing what it's doing

Edited by andy-xr on Wednesday 9th September 13:36

[tonyvid]

Visual thinking is a good way to look at this(pun intended) and I think you have completely got what is going on here with me and the way I have been looking at things and handing out the control of my happiness etc. It's actually very helpful and I'm too close to see that now and in my past.

The chess board is clever and I need to get my head around that concept. Sharing all our years of help sometimes gives moments of insight like this, thank you.

It's also good to have non-judgemental contributions in here. I know PH can bite your head off sometimes but I'm so pleased that this little corner gets the respect it deserves

My sister was telling me about an advert she had seen about mental health(I've not seen it) where it compares telling someone with mental health issues to brighten up is like telling someone who is deaf to listen - a good analogy.

[andymc]

Ive been on paroxetine for years now yes lately I've become anxious again, in the past I've used beer to self medicate along with benzo's, certainly not the answer, can anyone recommend calming methods?

ta
Andy