Jaymondo
20-10-09, 23:25
Hi all, my name is Jason I’m 32, and this is the story of how anxiety and depression first appeared in my life and how I am now coping with it.
I lost my Dad to cancer in late 2003, the next 2 years kind of whizzed by, but I felt good and had got back in contact with some family members after Dad’s funeral. We’d even all go on holiday together and had great trips.
Then, early in 2006 I was in the unfortunate position of having to dissolve the company I was a co-director of with one of my best friends. We had been working together since mid 2001 so as you can imagine this was a hard decision to take, but when the money stops coming in to the business it’s hard to keep it going.
From this point in 2006 – I found it very hard to get work again in I.T. and spent the next year unemployed which made me feel very low about myself and I found myself lessening the amount of activities I was doing, I’d cut out things that used to make me feel happy simple things like astronomy, going on little UK holidays and even going to football matches.
Then in April 2007 I found a job in I.T. which was with a really good company, the people in my department where about my age and we all had a good laugh together and socialised outside of work. This I felt was great, I started to feel like the old me again. Then after being in the job for about a year I started to feel very anxious as the job demanded more and more out of me.
Then in November 2007 my Nan passed away, she had lived with us for a long time and coming down the stairs that morning to go to work, only to see her lying there was really a living nightmare, she had had a heart attack. For many weeks after this, I felt I had to be strong for rest of my family.
Then when I went back to work after a week off on compassionate leave, I constantly felt like that I wasn’t doing the best I could and that others were doing a better job than me and I would feel like they all looked down on me. Of course this was all in my mind but after months of telling myself this I began to believe it.
Then one day whilst going for lunch, I stood waiting for the bus and then all of a sudden my eyes felt “wobbly” and the road seemed to move. I managed to get on the bus and just sat there trembling and sweating. I rang the bell to get off at the stop I wanted and as I did so felt a sharp pain in my throat and felt like I was choking.
I managed to get to the pub I was meeting friends at for lunch, and felt very ill and could not stop shaking. After about 2 hours of drinking nothing but cups of tea I managed to slowly regain control of both mind and body. Since then though in May 2009 this company went in to liquidation and I lost my job. Since then I have been working freelance.
But, ever since the day on the bus I have had constant health worries, from seeing a spot on my arm which I thought was something much worse to the slightest headache or pain in eye. I always imagine the worst now especially about my health. I have seen my GP many times in the past two years and have been on sleeping tablets and anti-depressants. When I have been on these I found they helped from time to time, but I refuse to become reliant on them.
I also took a test at my GP’s I cannot remember the name of it but was to measure stress and depression. After the health worker added the scores she said “I have a very severe case of acrophobia and high stress levels. Great I thought my life is over. However since then I have undergone CBT (cognitive behavioural therapy) which did help me to a point. I was able to face getting out in public again, all be it for short periods of a time.
Now that I am freelance I find myself choosing which days to work and often choose these according to how I “think I may feel” that day. I’ve been told this is a sure sign of anxiety and agoraphobia.
During all this time some of the symptoms I have had include – numbness in right side of my face, sharp pains in shoulders, severe headaches, floaters in eyes, ringing in ears, hyperventilation, general aches and pains, feeling of lump in throat. The worst one for me though is the unsteadiness I feel with movement, walking, sitting or in a car if something moves quickly I feel like my eyes cannot keep up with the movement, they become tense and I feel wobbly like sitting on a boat.
I even find myself re-adjusting floor rugs or curtains if they’re not straight as this can start me feeling that “wobbly” sensation. Crazy no but I’ve felt that way sometimes. One final thing to say is that my sleep patterns are all over the place. 2 hours some days, 6 hours on others then maybe 3 days without any.
I am currently not on any medication but sometimes feel I should be, when I was on sleeping tablets I found them to be pretty useless and I worried about taking them, which was probably why they didn’t work. I’ve learnt to cope with my sleeping patterns but I know that my lack of proper sleep is a major cause to many of my symptoms.
Well that’s my story, apologies if it’s a little all over the place, but I just wanted to get as much written down as I could. I ‘m feeling stronger again day by day but it’s still a struggle sometimes.
Thanks for taking time to read my story, remember all though the sensation maybe real the cause is often the simplest to rectify. Rest and talk about it to a friend or family member.
Thanks,
Jay
I lost my Dad to cancer in late 2003, the next 2 years kind of whizzed by, but I felt good and had got back in contact with some family members after Dad’s funeral. We’d even all go on holiday together and had great trips.
Then, early in 2006 I was in the unfortunate position of having to dissolve the company I was a co-director of with one of my best friends. We had been working together since mid 2001 so as you can imagine this was a hard decision to take, but when the money stops coming in to the business it’s hard to keep it going.
From this point in 2006 – I found it very hard to get work again in I.T. and spent the next year unemployed which made me feel very low about myself and I found myself lessening the amount of activities I was doing, I’d cut out things that used to make me feel happy simple things like astronomy, going on little UK holidays and even going to football matches.
Then in April 2007 I found a job in I.T. which was with a really good company, the people in my department where about my age and we all had a good laugh together and socialised outside of work. This I felt was great, I started to feel like the old me again. Then after being in the job for about a year I started to feel very anxious as the job demanded more and more out of me.
Then in November 2007 my Nan passed away, she had lived with us for a long time and coming down the stairs that morning to go to work, only to see her lying there was really a living nightmare, she had had a heart attack. For many weeks after this, I felt I had to be strong for rest of my family.
Then when I went back to work after a week off on compassionate leave, I constantly felt like that I wasn’t doing the best I could and that others were doing a better job than me and I would feel like they all looked down on me. Of course this was all in my mind but after months of telling myself this I began to believe it.
Then one day whilst going for lunch, I stood waiting for the bus and then all of a sudden my eyes felt “wobbly” and the road seemed to move. I managed to get on the bus and just sat there trembling and sweating. I rang the bell to get off at the stop I wanted and as I did so felt a sharp pain in my throat and felt like I was choking.
I managed to get to the pub I was meeting friends at for lunch, and felt very ill and could not stop shaking. After about 2 hours of drinking nothing but cups of tea I managed to slowly regain control of both mind and body. Since then though in May 2009 this company went in to liquidation and I lost my job. Since then I have been working freelance.
But, ever since the day on the bus I have had constant health worries, from seeing a spot on my arm which I thought was something much worse to the slightest headache or pain in eye. I always imagine the worst now especially about my health. I have seen my GP many times in the past two years and have been on sleeping tablets and anti-depressants. When I have been on these I found they helped from time to time, but I refuse to become reliant on them.
I also took a test at my GP’s I cannot remember the name of it but was to measure stress and depression. After the health worker added the scores she said “I have a very severe case of acrophobia and high stress levels. Great I thought my life is over. However since then I have undergone CBT (cognitive behavioural therapy) which did help me to a point. I was able to face getting out in public again, all be it for short periods of a time.
Now that I am freelance I find myself choosing which days to work and often choose these according to how I “think I may feel” that day. I’ve been told this is a sure sign of anxiety and agoraphobia.
During all this time some of the symptoms I have had include – numbness in right side of my face, sharp pains in shoulders, severe headaches, floaters in eyes, ringing in ears, hyperventilation, general aches and pains, feeling of lump in throat. The worst one for me though is the unsteadiness I feel with movement, walking, sitting or in a car if something moves quickly I feel like my eyes cannot keep up with the movement, they become tense and I feel wobbly like sitting on a boat.
I even find myself re-adjusting floor rugs or curtains if they’re not straight as this can start me feeling that “wobbly” sensation. Crazy no but I’ve felt that way sometimes. One final thing to say is that my sleep patterns are all over the place. 2 hours some days, 6 hours on others then maybe 3 days without any.
I am currently not on any medication but sometimes feel I should be, when I was on sleeping tablets I found them to be pretty useless and I worried about taking them, which was probably why they didn’t work. I’ve learnt to cope with my sleeping patterns but I know that my lack of proper sleep is a major cause to many of my symptoms.
Well that’s my story, apologies if it’s a little all over the place, but I just wanted to get as much written down as I could. I ‘m feeling stronger again day by day but it’s still a struggle sometimes.
Thanks for taking time to read my story, remember all though the sensation maybe real the cause is often the simplest to rectify. Rest and talk about it to a friend or family member.
Thanks,
Jay