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View Full Version : introduction - hello - family deaths/loss/suffering/dreadful childhood



chezpaul
12-09-10, 12:03
hello everyone.
i registered last night and understand it's good etiquette to introduce myself first.
i am a 37 year old man, married with two children.
one of four brothers, our mother died when i was four years old.
my eldest brother died when i was eight.
my childhood was awful - i was never even remotely close to happy as a kid. i never talked about any of our losses with the family and up until recently when i have talked to them all, believed i was the only one suffering and carried the entire weight of this myself.
it's understandable that this loss would have been difficult for any man to take and consequently, i experienced my father as cold and angry and violent. 'pathetic' has always been a word that has resonated for me throughtout my life and through therapy recently, i have learned that it was his parenting that has made me feel this way. for whatever reason, i was the lightning rod for all his anger - perhaps it was my being the youngest.
anyway, he died when i was 17. i may have been just on the brink of being able to talk to him.
i always felt inferior, second class. have never had any friends. my working life and relationships with people in general have always been poor.
a few years ago i went into full depression and began psychodynamic counselling. through this, i began to speak with my family and go to the grave.
in time, took ssri medication and eventually found the right one. that was february this year and with cbt therapy i felt 'cured' about a couple of months or so ago.
in speaking with the therapist, i learned that after a combination of medication and cbt, people who have come out of depression stop the cbt and carry on as normal. my take on this is that if it works, why not use it as a way of life anyway ? so despite the end of my treatment i continue to complete a cbt form for every one of 'those' events (you know what i'm talking about!)
i hope i've found the right place here at this forum. when i'm down, the feeling that 'i must be the only person in the world that feels like this' may be familiar to many people here and although i do not wish that feeling on anyone, i hope to find it a comfort that there are others out there going through this and we can be of help to each other.
thank you so much for taking time out to read this.

nomorepanic
12-09-10, 12:05
Hi chezpaul

We just wanted to welcome you aboard to NMP. We hope you enjoy your stay here and get all the support and advice you need.

Please take some time to read the website articles on the left as well for loads of advice and tips.

Tish
12-09-10, 12:56
Crikey Chezpaul,
you have had a hard life! It mirrors my own in several ways so find it amazing that after carrying all that angst for so many years, you now feel 'cured' in such a short time. I start counselling with a psychotherapist soon, I hope. You've given me hope that I can be helped, afterall.
I send you my very best wishes, Tish

Hazel B
12-09-10, 13:09
Hello and welcome.
I started to see a counsellor last week after bottling up many traumas for years and I'm hoping it will help me. I was similar, thinking I could protect everyone else and keep my pain inside. This brought me to a state of anxiety and meds to help slow my heart, so it cannot carrry on.
You have come to the right place and will find support here.

chezpaul
12-09-10, 14:42
hi tish and thank you.
it hurts doesn't it ? maybe in time i'll learn how we are connected.
i would like to make a point though - when i say 'cured' i mean my depressive episode has finished, which lasted about 4 years. so by that i only meant that i now have enough seratonin to be going on with.
for me it was 3 years of psychodynamic, but i honestly feel that because i was paying for it they were keeping me hanging on. then a year of failed ssri tablets, then about 6 months of the correct anti depressant coupled with 6 sessions of cbt.
there's so much more work to do but yes, with the right ingredients you can be helped. it's easy for us to believe that we are hopeless and not worth bothering about eh ?


Crikey Chezpaul,
you have had a hard life! It mirrors my own in several ways so find it amazing that after carrying all that angst for so many years, you now feel 'cured' in such a short time. I start counselling with a psychotherapist soon, I hope. You've given me hope that I can be helped, afterall.
I send you my very best wishes, Tish

chezpaul
12-09-10, 14:44
hazel you are so kind.
i'm wondering what kind of counselling you are having ?
i can only say from my own experience that psychodynamic works for winkling out the root cause of our pain because it goes right back to childhood.
for me, i learned through this counselling that pretty much everything was screwed up after my mother died.


Hello and welcome.
I started to see a counsellor last week after bottling up many traumas for years and I'm hoping it will help me. I was similar, thinking I could protect everyone else and keep my pain inside. This brought me to a state of anxiety and meds to help slow my heart, so it cannot carrry on.
You have come to the right place and will find support here.

Hazel B
12-09-10, 14:55
I think it's pschodynamic, not CBT. I talked a lot in 50 minutes (only had one session so far) and it seemed like only 5 minutes had passed!
I keep everything inside like a locked up library with different boxes of dusty books, it has to come out or I think it will make me more anxious.

The past 3 years have been too much, I won't say much on the public forum but bereavements, job loss, then many health tests on my liver pushed me too far (NHS take so long to diagnose!)

Thank you for posting as it makes me feel I can get through this phase, I have lost lots of weight and am not sleeping well so I can't get much worse.

Fly away Katie
12-09-10, 16:55
Hello and a warm welcome to No More Panic x x x

chezpaul
12-09-10, 23:39
thank you so much everyone who has taken the trouble to greet me.
i don't want to tread on any toes here so if this is the wrong thread to open up dialogues with people i'm happy to move on to another category. hazel b that's mostly aimed at yourself, but i'd welcome advice from anyone as to where i should go on this forum to get the ball rolling.
i'm particularly keen to talk about those 'triggering' events. you know the ones that happen and you question your own existence ? they usually involve social encounters and after them you end up scalding yourself and replaying them in your mind, wishing you had dealt with the situation in a different way.

paula lynne
12-09-10, 23:47
HI Im Paula, new to NMP too...its nice to meet you, how wonderful you are married with two kiddies after such awful experiences. I dont really understand what you are going through ( Im agoraphobic, with panic attacks and general anxiety) but I just want to say its good to know you and thanks for sharing your story. Hope you feel better soon, and you will find many good friends here I know. Best wishes...x:welcome: