Mental Health Thread • Page 385

Love you all. This website and it’s people mean a lot to me.

 

Well I got an apartment. It’s a little more than I wanted to spend a month but fuck it I liked it. It’s a 2 bedroom and 1.5 bathrooms and pretty fucking nice. I plan on staying here for awhile because this entire process has fucked me up and I don’t know if I’ll be buying a house ever again. I’m moving in on Saturday so this is the last week with my dog. We’ve agreed that I can come take him for the day like once a month which is nice but it’s gonna fucking kill me to not see him everyday. That’s the part that breaks my heart the most.

 

Having to make an unnecessary phone call to resolve an issue that shouldn’t have happened gives me so much anxiety just thinking about it. I hate making phone calls!

 

My grandpa’s health has been declining, he’s had complications from chemo and he had to be hospitalized for lung/breathing issues that may of caused permanent damage. I’ve also been wrestling with loneliness, I live alone in my apartment when my daughter isn’t there and it’s just hard to cope with it. I’m also always worried I’m gonna wake up in the middle of the night and see someone standing in my doorway watching me so it’s hard to sleep too.

 

One step at a time man. It's fucking tough, but good going on the place. That's a big step. Try to enjoy your week with the dog.

 

I lost my grandpa earlier this year and I was sober when it happened and it had nothing to do with my relapse two months later. Tbh that was the first time I ever lost someone that close to me through death. We were very close. He was close with pretty much everyone in my family. Several of my parents friends came to the wake just because he touched everyone’s life he ever met. It was a hard loss and I still get upset thinking about it especially during the holidays since we always did Christmas at grandma and grandpas house growing up and well into adulthood. But what I learned about myself is that I am much more resilient than I give myself credit for. I’m sure you are too. It’s gonna suck and you never really “get through it,” you just adjust to a new normal. That’s the most we can do.

 

Also do you have a pet @DarkHotline? Having my cat while living alone these past several months has done wonders for my mental health and is part of why I’m doing so much better than the last time I moved back home since my gf kept him that time. Even back when I had gerbils they kept me plenty of company. Not having your daughter all the time absolutely sucks, a pet would still give you something to take care of every day which did a lot to combat my loneliness. Just a thought because I get it

 

I’m so sorry to hear that. I hope he’s doing okay. I haven’t lived on my own in forever and I have the same fears as you. My mind just goes crazy when I’m in an apartment/house alone. I can’t have dogs at my new apartment but plan on getting a cat. For some reason just having some sort of animal that depends on me helps me out immensely.

 

I don’t sadly. I thought about getting a cat but I don’t really have any place to put a litter box that wouldn’t be in the way or potentially contaminate like food or something.

This is the first time I’ve lived alone, other times it was with an ex or with roommates. Like it’s definitely nice to have my own place with my own rules and privacy but since I deal with anxiety and occasional paranoia, I’m always worried about like crazy what if situations or if like something happened to me in my sleep or in an accident around the apartment and my daughter was by herself. I need to deal with that too.

 

This right here. This has been the hardest lesson for me to learn in therapy. When I first started therapy I viewed it as a “cure” or solution to every problem that I wanted to rid myself of or fix. Sometimes, though, there is no fixing it and “fixing” isn’t ultimately the goal which is sort of a shit realization when you finally come to it. The goal is just as you said; adjust to a new normal. Accept that there are some things you can never really get through and instead do your best to adjust, adjust, adjust. And yeah, reminding yourself of your own resilience is so important. My therapist has repeated to me, many times now because I guess it’s just something I keep needing to hear, that we have to learn to understand what the parts of our mind were doing at the time in an attempt to survive. I realized very recently that for the longest time I have so thoroughly broken my life up into chapters of “before” and “after” that I give all the love and longing to the parts of myself that existed in the before and all of my anger, resentment, and hatred to the parts of me that developed in the “after”. And of course living like that will only make you feel worse because those parts of you aren’t getting the love and attention they need let alone the understanding that they were confused and afraid and just doing whatever they thought was best at the time to get you to where you are right now. You have to learn to give yourself credit for that, no matter how painful it may be.

 

There are so many good things in my life right now, and I feel like I’m on a good path, but I still can’t stand myself most of the time.

 

Yep. I have no real reason to be unhappy right now, but I feel like I don't deserve any of the relationships I have. I feel like a bad person, whether I did something specific to prompt that feeling or not. It makes life draining.

 

It’s so fucking hard man. I’m in the best place I’ve ever been in ever. Yet I walk around with this insane amount of baggage, just having seen the things I’ve seen and done the things I’ve done is hard enough to live with, I don’t know how to not feel so bad about my past other than being better every day than I was yesterday. It still isn’t enough. I am haunted by years of self inflicted traumas and traumatizing others, it won’t ever leave me and it scares me to know that.

 

I've woken up mid-panic attack twice this week and it's awful, I can't seem to diagnose the issue. I don't seem to remember any particularly stressful dream. But I wake up to my heart pounding and feeling like I need to throw up.

 

If you haven’t already you should go see a doctor. Your heart is nothing to mess with.

 

I’ve been reflecting on 2022 alone tonight in my apartment, sober for the first NYE in years. This year has been a huge fundamental shift in my life, started it down in the dumps at a low point in my life and now at the end of it, I’m doing much better. It’s kinda bittersweet getting my shit together (mostly) in my 30’s but I feel optimistic too. I think next year won’t be the greatest year ever because that’s unrealistic but I think it’ll be a good one, I got a feeling about it.

 

I place too many expectations on holidays and then shut down when they don't go well, completely eliminating any chance of trying to salvage it. Outwardly I try to pretend I don't care and keep expectations low while on the inside I do want to have a nice time. I'm not saying I need something extravagant. If anything I do think my expectations are still low yet reality still falls short. I spent both Christmas and new years crying and upset for stupid reasons and I just hate it. I feel like time off work is a precious limited resource and I hate spending it upset and disappointed. I just want to feel happy and have fun and something always seems to fall short.

 

Moved into my apartment yesterday but didn’t get to set anything up because I went to my friend’s for NYE. Came back this morning and 2 of my outlets in the kitchen don’t work, my shower rod fell down and big lots gave me the wrong love seat. Not a great start.

 

Ughh that sucks man, any chance you have a breaker box you could flip for those bad outlets?

 

yeah I tried that, tried the reset button and even tried to see if for some reason they are linked to a light switch and no luck. Just going to have to wait until the leasing agent is in the office tomorrow.

 

Does your complex have an emergency maintenance service/number to call?

 

I think so but I’m just going to wait until tomorrow. Set up my bed and couch and tv and am just going to chill for the night. I appreciate the suggestion though.

 

Nothing too extreme, just really, really struggling with going back to work tomorrow after a week off. Anxiety is through the roof.

 

This is wild, like you were in your car for this when it happened?! So random! Glad you’re ok and they caught the guy but wtf I would not know what to think

 

Keep having to remind myself not to compare and that everyone is showing their 2022 highlight reel with their retrospectives but mine was pretty mid and lonely. Though looking at pictures throughout the year, there were some good things I forgot and was happy to acknowledge. But otherwise my year was like sad lonely and boring lol