Is there a way out?

[cactuarjon]

Sorry if this isn't in the right place. This post is more of a 'woe is me' tbh.

I've had anxiety and stress for as long as i can remember. Its just that until the past few years, I've not understood it was that, or that anything was wrong. But the past few years (well, about 5-7yrs) it's like i'm becoming self-aware of all these problems i have and it is starting to drive me crazy.

There's a pattern emerging regarding my concentration and my inability to pay proper attention to certain things. I'm picking up on communication issues and what it is about them that make me feel awkward and uncomfortable when socialising. I am starting to feel really simple, people talk about something, and everyone all understands what's happening and I just fail to keep up, I just can't understand!

I have seen several GP's, counselling, therapy, medication... I'm exhausted!!

I know a large part of the process is accepting myself for who i am, and being honest with other people about the issues I face, but that's the biggest challenge ever. Especially since I'm just no good at explaining my issues since i don't fully understand them myself. One of the reasons why I feel like none of the therapy and counselling has come to anything. How can you fix something when you can't properly explain what the problem is?

I'm sorry, I sound really whiny. I hate being whiny :(

[Bigboyuk]

hi Think you have posted in the right place so don't worry (if it's in the wrong place the mods will move it :) ) Yeah it can get very tiring trying to find the right meds/therapy but you have to keep going till you do find the right things that will help you :)

Have you seen a phyciatrist (soz for the spelling error) Do you have short term memory problems and depression? when you had various therapies did you apply and of the techniques to your conditions? It's about finding what works for you. Cheers

[nikkinik]

I've always been shy right from being a kid.. I've never been one to speak if there's more than one person around(!), never made friends easily, never kept them when I did make some..
in some ways it's got easier as I've got older.. In others it's much harder. I still don't have any friends though! Lol I find it a little easier to speak to people, small talk is fine, but the deeper, let's shoot the breeze for a bit.. No, big no...
I don't go to any parties or social gatherings, it's like pulling teeth for me. I don't speak coherently as it is, I'm always mumbling, probably because I know I won't get out a decent sentance and therefore don't want to be heard, that in itself of course poses problems because people can't hear me to understand anyway, so most of the time they either nod politely or just outright pull a face and clear off..! Lol

I've just started volunteering a few hours a week, in the hopes it will help my confidence.. It's not worked! I'm so self conscious that I've come to realise I don't even like people looking at me, let alone speak to me. I stand there thinking they're thinking how ugly I am, are they looking at my thinning hair (for whatever reason, it's falling out.. that said, apparently no one has noticed other than me)..
But the biggest thing I've noticed is my inability to follow instructions, despite listening and paying attention I still miss details and end up asking questions 3 times over, asking something I've already been told, or just flat out get it wrong despite trying my best.. Then of course, I'm noticing it more and more and feeling worse and worse! If I thought I wasn't trying I'd be ok with it, but I'm genuinely trying my best.
So on top of it all, I now feel like I'm dumb! Lol

I am on amitryptlene and I know there's been cases of impaired memory, but my ibs is horrendous without it, so it's the better of two evils. Physically I won't be able to function without it, with it and mentally I'm a mess!

I'm generally scatty, tending to start one job whilst forgetting the first, I can't take things in at all..
So mentally I can't keep up either, I also never ever manage to think of anything to say to keep a conversation going. I'm interested, I'm engaged in what ppl are saying, but my responses are pretty much non existent.. So that makes me more self conscious that i must be boring, and questions raise about why on earth anyone would want to speak to me in the first place!

I find the older I get the worse I become. I thought I would settle into myself if you like.. But nope. I now notice every little fault I have and they play on my mind constantly.

I've done counselling, Cbt, I'm on medication... My Cbt was to help my agoraphobia, it helped. But I've come to realise that I actually loathe myself.. When I asked for Cbt on that I just got told I was selfish, I had a husband that loved me and liked me and that I must have too much time on my hands. Basically get a job, get over yourself. This was from therapist at the NHS Lets Talk programme.. I didn't follow through with it after that, I've basically given up wanting help if that's what I'll get, because it made me feel 100x worse.

I know a large part of the process is accepting myself for who i am too.. But I do struggle.
I accept anxiety will always be a part of me, I can cope with it for the most part, that is I can keep it under control.. But as for liking myself, I know I won't ever do that.

It sounds like you just need to talk more with people in a similar position, people with whom you can relate to and that in itself may help you figure some stuff out?

Out of curiosity, how old are you?

[cactuarjon]

I've always been shy right from being a kid.. I've never been one to speak if there's more than one person around(!), never made friends easily, never kept them when I did make some..
in some ways it's got easier as I've got older.. In others it's much harder. I still don't have any friends though! Lol I find it a little easier to speak to people, small talk is fine, but the deeper, let's shoot the breeze for a bit.. No, big no...
I don't go to any parties or social gatherings, it's like pulling teeth for me. I don't speak coherently as it is, I'm always mumbling, probably because I know I won't get out a decent sentance and therefore don't want to be heard, that in itself of course poses problems because people can't hear me to understand anyway, so most of the time they either nod politely or just outright pull a face and clear off..! Lol

I've just started volunteering a few hours a week, in the hopes it will help my confidence.. It's not worked! I'm so self conscious that I've come to realise I don't even like people looking at me, let alone speak to me. I stand there thinking they're thinking how ugly I am, are they looking at my thinning hair (for whatever reason, it's falling out.. that said, apparently no one has noticed other than me)..
But the biggest thing I've noticed is my inability to follow instructions, despite listening and paying attention I still miss details and end up asking questions 3 times over, asking something I've already been told, or just flat out get it wrong despite trying my best.. Then of course, I'm noticing it more and more and feeling worse and worse! If I thought I wasn't trying I'd be ok with it, but I'm genuinely trying my best.
So on top of it all, I now feel like I'm dumb! Lol

I am on amitryptlene and I know there's been cases of impaired memory, but my ibs is horrendous without it, so it's the better of two evils. Physically I won't be able to function without it, with it and mentally I'm a mess!

I'm generally scatty, tending to start one job whilst forgetting the first, I can't take things in at all..
So mentally I can't keep up either, I also never ever manage to think of anything to say to keep a conversation going. I'm interested, I'm engaged in what ppl are saying, but my responses are pretty much non existent.. So that makes me more self conscious that i must be boring, and questions raise about why on earth anyone would want to speak to me in the first place!

I find the older I get the worse I become. I thought I would settle into myself if you like.. But nope. I now notice every little fault I have and they play on my mind constantly.

I've done counselling, Cbt, I'm on medication... My Cbt was to help my agoraphobia, it helped. But I've come to realise that I actually loathe myself.. When I asked for Cbt on that I just got told I was selfish, I had a husband that loved me and liked me and that I must have too much time on my hands. Basically get a job, get over yourself. This was from therapist at the NHS Lets Talk programme.. I didn't follow through with it after that, I've basically given up wanting help if that's what I'll get, because it made me feel 100x worse.

I know a large part of the process is accepting myself for who i am too.. But I do struggle.
I accept anxiety will always be a part of me, I can cope with it for the most part, that is I can keep it under control.. But as for liking myself, I know I won't ever do that.

It sounds like you just need to talk more with people in a similar position, people with whom you can relate to and that in itself may help you figure some stuff out?

Out of curiosity, how old are you?@nikkinik you talk so much sense lol

I've recently plucked up the courage to go to an anxiety support group. It was nice to just be amongst people and have absolutely no pressure to sit there and not say a word! I just listened for now. One guy there shared his way of dealing with his own anxiety and I liked what he said.

He said that even if he gets to 88 and he's not found a solution to deal g with his anxiety in the best way, that's ok. He's ****ed from the get go, but he'll have put his best efforts in, managed to get himself out of bed and to work and on those occasions where he's struggled to get there, it's ok.

I think it's the whole 'yeah, I've got anxiety, and yeah, it ****s with my life. But hey, that's ok because anxiety is an illness, it IS going to impair you. But guess what, we can do our best, and that's ok'

I need to accept that anxiety isn't just a state of mind, it is an illness. It can't be cured. It won't go away. Knowing this already is starting to make me feel better about it.

Oh, I'm 32 btw (and yeah, it's bad that I'm actually starting to forget how old I am and I find myself every now and then having to stop everything to work out how old I am [emoji23] for about six months last year I kept telling everyone I was 30!) #goingsenile

Sent from my HTC One M9 using Tapatalk

[Bigboyuk]

@nikkinik you talk so much sense lol

I've recently plucked up the courage to go to an anxiety support group. It was nice to just be amongst people and have absolutely no pressure to sit there and not say a word! I just listened for now. One guy there shared his way of dealing with his own anxiety and I liked what he said.

He said that even if he gets to 88 and he's not found a solution to deal g with his anxiety in the best way, that's ok. He's ****ed from the get go, but he'll have put his best efforts in, managed to get himself out of bed and to work and on those occasions where he's struggled to get there, it's ok.

I think it's the whole 'yeah, I've got anxiety, and yeah, it ****s with my life. But hey, that's ok because anxiety is an illness, it IS going to impair you. But guess what, we can do our best, and that's ok'

I need to accept that anxiety isn't just a state of mind, it is an illness. It can't be cured. It won't go away. Knowing this already is starting to make me feel better about it.

Oh, I'm 32 btw (and yeah, it's bad that I'm actually starting to forget how old I am and I find myself every now and then having to stop everything to work out how old I am [emoji23] for about six months last year I kept telling everyone I was 30!) #goingsenile

Sent from my HTC One M9 using TapatalkHi cactuarjon sure it cant be cured as such but it can be greatly reduced to the point where it becomes manageable ( I was in a very bad way 7 months ago and I too hated my self big time, now iam seeingthe light clearer now!!) Iam currently in a 12 step programme run by a mental health charity called Changes its be going for over 2 decades and will help any yes any MH condition we also each set weekly goals to achieve too :) And yeah its about being able to accept the things you cant change, have the courage to change the things you can and the 'wisdom' to know the difference :) Cheers

[I Don't Get it!]

When you were a child (this is addressed to anybody on this thread who feels same as OP), did somebody or something make you feel rejected or not good enough?

Now that my own Anxiety and Depression is getting better, I'm starting to think that all my Anxiety and fearfulness were caused by low self esteem which started when I was very young. I'm now working on my self esteem and confidence and it's very slowly making a difference to how I feel and how I think about things that used to make me anxious.

I'm not sure that I agree that Anxiety can't be cured, I don't want to believe that. CBT helped me to see how much my way of thinking was keeping me down. I pretty much scoffed at the idea when I first heard it, but that was when I was feeling very anxious and depressed - now that I'm feeling better I can see the truth of it. I know not everybody is the same, but that was my experience.

One of the first bits of "homework" my therapist gave me actually had me wondering if I should bother going back, it seemed so simple-minded to me. He told me to postpone my worries to a scheduled time and place (at the time I was waking up worrying about problems and pretty much obsessing about them all day). I decided to do it anyway and scheduled my worry time to be 4.30pm the next day. Every time I noticed a worrying thought pop into my head I had to say to myself, "I will worry about that tomorrow at 4.30, but not now" and then I'd get on with whatever I was doing or had to do instead. I thought the idea was ludicrous, but to my great surprise it actually worked. When 4.30 the next day came I realised I didn't want to be bothered with worrying (most of the stuff I was worrying about was nonsense, like my partner going out on a job and being stabbed or having a car crash - stuff that used to play on my mind all the time).

Like somebody else said, it's a question of trying different things and seeing what works for you.

[Bigboyuk]

When you were a child (this is addressed to anybody on this thread who feels same as OP), did somebody or something make you feel rejected or not good enough?

Now that my own Anxiety and Depression is getting better, I'm starting to think that all my Anxiety and fearfulness were caused by low self esteem which started when I was very young. I'm now working on my self esteem and confidence and it's very slowly making a difference to how I feel and how I think about things that used to make me anxious.

I'm not sure that I agree that Anxiety can't be cured, I don't want to believe that. CBT helped me to see how much my way of thinking was keeping me down. I pretty much scoffed at the idea when I first heard it, but that was when I was feeling very anxious and depressed - now that I'm feeling better I can see the truth of it. I know not everybody is the same, but that was my experience.

One of the first bits of "homework" my therapist gave me actually had me wondering if I should bother going back, it seemed so simple-minded to me. He told me to postpone my worries to a scheduled time and place (at the time I was waking up worrying about problems and pretty much obsessing about them all day). I decided to do it anyway and scheduled my worry time to be 4.30pm the next day. Every time I noticed a worrying thought pop into my head I had to say to myself, "I will worry about that tomorrow at 4.30, but not now" and then I'd get on with whatever I was doing or had to do instead. I thought the idea was ludicrous, but to my great surprise it actually worked. When 4.30 the next day came I realised I didn't want to be bothered with worrying (most of the stuff I was worrying about was nonsense, like my partner going out on a job and being stabbed or having a car crash - stuff that used to play on my mind all the time).

Like somebody else said, it's a question of trying different things and seeing what works for you. Hi I Don't Get It yeah deffo for me I was being bullied a lot at school and excluded from various activities so made me even more sad and unwanted and it was terrible so I tended to shut my self off from being with people and sleep most of the day I was in a very bad way same things happened as I was growing up and had no friends and still a bit thin on the ground regarding friends but not as bad :) I was convinced every human being sucked and was bad wanted to commit suicide a few times, but still here by the grace of God but many years of my life has been wasted now but I am moving forward (not as fast as I would like but at least it's forward :) )

[I Don't Get it!]

Bigboyuk, me too. School was hell for me.

I'm glad you're making progress, and I think slow progress is the best kind. I've found that trying to get better too quickly results in a relapse (it does for me, anyway).

Take it easy! :)