Mental Health Thread • Page 389

Adderall rocks

 

Wanted to reply to this earlier because I have these kinds of nightmares all the time. For me it’s these frequent nightmares where my wife is suddenly hanging out again with this guy she had a sorta thing with before she and I started dating. That guy also happened to be a former friend of mine and he was particularly…handsy. It’s one of the reasons she cut him off before it could even go anywhere. Part of those dreams reoccurring for me is because that relationship developed during a very dark and lonely period of my life and when she came back into my life a couple years later it was a bit of a shock to find out about it. He’d just never really been her type and I knew he had a reputation that preceded him on top of knowing how he was when there were no females in the room to hear him. I also felt jealous because she had a whole lot of stories and pictures and videos of that time period where she and that guy were hanging out together with a group of people I’d once thought were my friends but had just kind of walked away from me. When I was first confronted with all of that, it really hurt because those two years had been very, very lonely but I didn’t want to say anything to her about it because I felt like it wouldn’t be fair to her because those were her memories and I didn’t want to make it seem like I was trying to ruin them or take them away from her. Nevertheless, the feelings never went away and it always felt like this weird gap of time where I had no idea what was going on in her life (we’d been best friends since childhood). Those thoughts manifested into nightmares where my mind ran rampant with made up scenarios that felt so horribly real and I’d wake up feeling exhausted and emotionally drained. It still happens from time to time (happened earlier this week actually) and I’m always dying to find a way out of it and wake up. I always try to do my best to focus on being present and remembering the good things in my life, but I also know those feelings and parts of myself are surfacing in my dreams because they want my attention for one reason or another. I don’t know. Just read this post and felt like “yeah. I know this feeling. It’s awful.”

 

So I'm nocturnal now and I don't know what to do. I spent the past two days in bed trying to reset my sleep schedule and I think I've made things worse. I don't have any reason to get out of bed ever and I just want to be a normal, functioning human being. Now I'm scared of dying and the fact that I've wasted so much of my life doing nothing and lying in bed.

 

Ooooo yeah I will have those dreams about my ex here and there and always wake up with a weird feeling/mood. Like it's really weird to have a vivid dream about my ex from like 15 years ago where we're still involved in some way and then wake up in reality haha. Always puts me in a weird mood when it happens.

 

Anyone find themselves mixing up excitement and anxiety?

 

Literally allllllll the time.

 

They’re different?

 

had a weird experience with a long-time close friend who's suddenly shut himself off from me saying he needed to leave a mutual Discord server we've essentially been using to keep in touch for like six years for 'personal reasons'. everyone has their own stuff to deal with, I know, but we haven't spoken in two weeks. I just hope he sticks around. as a consequence of this I wonder if he's just tired of me, and who else might be. I also lost my passport this week so I can't travel tomorrow like I was supposed to, and as if things didn't suck enough already I might be out of a job next week. which is to say it is so fucked in my head right now I don't know what to do.

 

Just found out a friend of mine is likely to get a job that pays $200k more than mine. I know I should be happy for him and deep down I am but it’s sent me into an anxiety/self-loathing spiral and I feel like absolute shit. Both about the salaries in my field and for feeling bad for not being outwardly excited for my friend. I was already stressed about being able to afford whatever repairs my car currently needs. Today needs to end.

 

Oof. Definitely been there. Such an awkward and shitty position to be in and so many layers to it too.

I’ve also weirdly been kind of on the opposite end of that. Two of my good friends from high school were the super smart AND athletic types and they got an apartment together after going to fancy colleges with partial scholarships and such (been together since 6th grade and now married with kids, Disney Channel come get these actors what the fuck). I moved into the same complex but a few buildings separated us but the rent was likely the same or mine was maybe more because my building was newer and I felt that as soon as I moved there they disliked it. At the time I didn’t have a college degree but had a fancy pretend-to-be-important office job like they did and I think they really were jaded that I, someone without a degree, could afford to live in the same type of apartment as they could. Our relationship soon fizzled out after ironically enough living the closest we ever had in the 15+ years we were friends but they really did seem… idk, jaded that I could afford what they could.

 

And what I originally came here to post was that this week has been an absolute wrecking ball of hell at work and I feel like each passing week just goes faster and faster and more and more time slips away and I can barely keep traction on projects but know that I kind of love being so busy and connected to so many things at work and that telling my boss I need help or need to offload some shit to others will make me feel bad because it will feel like taking a shortcut to get out of it and also I know I will hate what someone else does with the project.

There are times I wish I worked in manufacturing or something where you didn’t bring your work home with you - not saying those jobs are easy, they are not, I used to do them, but goddamn the best part was knowing that when your shift was done it was the next shifts problem, not yours.

But, I did that type of work and after 5 months I was climbing the walls and got out so I know for me that’s not sustainable but I wish I could truly unplug more than I do. One of the very, very slight bad parts of working remote - my desk is right there! It’s just staring at me and I could work! I could work till 8 am Monday nonstop! Not going to but you get the idea.

 

I had a mental breakdown at work on Thursday. It was a ton of things coming to a head at once, and what brought it on was one of my coworkers giving me constructive criticism. It's normally something I'd handle totally fine, but for whatever reason, it just sent me completely over the edge and I had to go home in between shifts to take a nap and relax. I was barely able to drive myself home because I was shaking and sobbing so bad. But I guess the bright side is that since it happened, I've felt mostly fine.

"Mostly fine", because I've been functional since then but have been wrestling with other feelings. Some of it is what I think could be survivor's guilt relating to COVID, and some of it having to do with gender. Like... I haven't gotten COVID even once ever since it's been a thing. I've made sure to stay on top of vaccinations and boosters, but I can't help but feel guilty when people I care about have gotten it and some have died. I'm not saying I deserve to get it or anything, but it just seems unfair that everyone in my friend groups have all been safe and careful and they ended up getting it and I somehow never did. It's hard for me to be positive about it because none of them deserved to be put through that. The gender stuff basically comes down to struggling to walk the line between "I want people to know what I am" and "I don't want anyone to know what I am". I started being more open about being non-binary in the rhythm game communities I'm involved in, which is a net positive and everyone in those communities has been super cool about it. But I can't be open about it at work when the majority of my coworkers are transphobic boomers. It's frustrating because I genuinely love my job and the kids I work with, but having to hide who I am sucks.

I'm sorry if this just comes across as a bunch of rambling shit. It's difficult to parse all of this into anything cohesive because nothing in my brain is ever cohesive

 

I reset my schedule for a day and then the next day I'm nocturnal again. I'm going fucking crazy. I'm just completely missing days. Do I just get out of bed now and stay up all day or do I stay in bed and try to sleep until the morning and get up then?

I don't even know.

Also they say that you never catch up on sleep. When you miss it, it's gone forever.

 

My gf still isn’t here because she got Covid and still has it bad and now I’m sick again for the second time this month, dunno if it’s Covid or not yet, but god I’m so fucking sick of this. I’ve been missing work a ton during an already unbearably slow season and I’m stating to get antsy about my finances again

 

I truly hope it's not COVID and that you both get better soon. Being sick that much blows.

 

Do you have a doctor you see about your sleep issues? If you are trying to get on a regular schedule you probably want to stay up and try to sleep at night, maybe with a nap if you’re feeling drained.
I had a period where I was staying up until 4 am and sleeping past 3pm. It was hard to shake but just going to bed at a reasonable time, and even if it takes forever to fall asleep just getting up at a regular time helped get me in a regular schedule. I still do have sleep issues though. It may be true that you can’t “catch up” on lost sleep but it’s also true that getting a good nights sleep makes you feel a lot better so I try not to worry about lost sleep.

 

When I can't sleep, I also try to remember that simply resting my brain is better than nothing. Sorry, I know that isn't much help.

 

Trazodone is the only reason I sleep regularly.

 

Besides my sleep, I uh, kind of have no idea what to do with my life and I might be about to lose my health insurance which is a huge deal because I have some serious issues so like I don't know what to do

 

Trying to clean out my apartment before I move so I decided to go through my clothes and that was a mistake! I've gained some weight but I basically live in comfy clothes bc I work from home and like 2 pair of jeans that I love so when I tried on other stuff.....ugh. It's worse than I thought. Everything I wore last summer either doesn't fit or barely fits. I feel ugly in everything. I've never really felt confident in the way I look so weighing the most I've ever weighed is definitely not helping at all. And I saw old pictures of myself and wish I looked like that now which is really messed up bc I know I basically had an eating disorder and that was why I was so thin. I always walk this really thin line of wanting to eat better/exercise but also not take it to the extreme bc I know I can do that very easily. So then when I feel like I'm gonna spiral I just completely stop bc I'm afraid I'll get back to unhealthy habits. It's just been a lifelong struggle for me. And I was never the "pretty" one in my friend group and even in my own family everyone constantly talks about how pretty my cousins are but never say that about me. I'm always the "smart" one or the "responsible" one which I like being those things but I'd like to for once be the pretty one.

 

Feel this 100%. I still struggle with it every day, but best I can offer is try to remember that there is no ideal shape And trying to force your body to be something it isn't will only make you miserable - at least in my experience. Bodies change shape with time and that's okay; it doesn't define you.

 

I take Gabapentin for sleep and other menopause related things. It's literally changed my life.

 

I can be such a judgemental bitch sometimes. I used to hate how judgemental my family was because as a youth I just wanted to feel accepted and somehow I'm this way too now and I don't realize im doing it all the time until I've said the thing and it sucks. Even if I don't say it aloud I'm often thinking it and idk why. Such an ugly quality to have. I feel like I'm a bad parody of the sarcastic character in a sitcom. Except irl it's not a quippy laugh track to Darlene Conor or Chandler Bing. Its just unpleasant. Hate that so far being in my 30s is realizing I have inherited all the qualities I resented in my parents.

 

Joining the fucked-up dream club with everyone else. Had a bad falling out with a close friend last August(?) and she still shows up in my dreams semi-regularly. And even though the split was necessary, I miss her a lot, especially when I wake up.

 

I'm crying because I hate that I've gotten older. I have a disease which statistically means I'm likely to die much younger than everyone else and I'm missing my youth so much.

Reading or watching things where people are growing up and going through high school and college makes me so sad.

I hate it. I really hate it. I wish life itself were so different.