• 💖 [Donate To Keep MyPTSD Online] 💖 Every contribution, no matter how small, fuels our mission and helps us continue to provide peer-to-peer services. Your generosity keeps us independent and available freely to the world. MyPTSD closes if we can't reach our annual goal.

Nothing is going right, stuck in a fog

Status
Not open for further replies.

Strangelongtrip

MyPTSD Pro
I haven't been able to improve my mental health basically since last July 2020. I've tried one new med, getting off another med, I've been in intensive therapy, I have a wonderful friend network, my family is relatively supportive, I just feel horrible, all of the time. I'm going to a new psych next week that I really hope will help. I filled out their forms and realized that I have felt severe anxiety and depression almost every single day for MONTHS. I've lost all interest in everything. I can only watch shows I've see before to focus (but I have been able to read). I don't want to write anymore other than to air out my feelings and how much I hate myself. I can't focus, I can't feel anything, it just feels like I'm in a constant fog. I don't see a point in living. I don't see a future for me.

I have no control, it feels. I've been waiting to move to another state since October 2019 and it's not in my control but like, I'm a full 24 year old and I need to take control of myself and my life. I just don't know how. I feel like such a failure. I can't decide where to work or where to live. I graduate college this spring, and I had one idea for a career, but I felt like it was just going along with what my parents wanted, but the career I want I haven't prepared for. I'll have a day here and there where I feel super happy, or a few hours here and there, but overall, a majority of the days I'm either having panic attacks, I'm suicidal, or both.

I think about suicide more and more, it seems more and more tempting. I feel like I'm never getting out of this. I don't have a direction for my life, for my career, I can't even think about myself. I spend most of my time just using social interactions as a crutch to feel happy (I have awesome friends and a crush lol, but honestly I wish I didn't because I hate feeling vulnerable). I don't know how to do anything. I don't know how to form romantic relationships, I don't know how to discern my feelings for someone, I don't want to communicate what I'm feeling, I don't want to be real, I don't want to do this, I jut want to ignore everyone and everything for a few months until I have my life together. I don't know how to be honest. I don't know how to work. I lost my business I had for 18 years because of COVID and I just have no drive to do anything else. I applied to like 250 jobs across country last year and got none of them. I gave up. I don't know how to get a job, or be a real person. I don't know how to live. I just feel like I lost everything. Like I lost a lot of loved ones during this pandemic too, I haven't even dealt with that. I lost all direction, and I hate that, because I felt so sure of myself and my life and my direction for so long. I had passion, I had drive, I had a reason for existing. It's all gone now.

I feel like such a failure in every aspect of my life and I just feel like I don't know how to get out of this. I don't know how to make myself feel better. I just wish I were dead or I didn't exist. Life just doesn't feel worth it. I feel like it'll be this terrible forever. I have so many things I'm grateful for but honestly, I would give it all up just to feel nothing or not exist. I feel like I'm not deserving of the things I have mainly because of BPD symptoms/trauma. I feel like I wish people would be horrible to me again so then I'd have an excuse as to why I feel so terrible and not just "I'm so broken nothing will fix me."

I have a new psych appointment next week and therapy so I just have to hang in there. I just don't see a point. It feels good to let it all out tho.
 
Hey, sounds like you’ve had a really shitty past year. I’m sorry for everything that’s happened, it can be rough when you think you should be improving but you’re just stuck in the same place.

I know what it’s like to deal with similar feelings— that no matter what I do it feels like my symptoms are always hitting with similar regularity/severity. I find one thing that helps me is to remember that although I feel as if the only problem is me, in reality outside circumstances and a warped perspective on my own progress is at least partly to blame. I often find by the time I’ve solved a problem I’ve also gained awareness about five new things I need to work on, so it feels like my mental health is getting worse when it’s actually improving I’m just more aware of it.

This may sound counter intuitive but I also find it helpful to think along the lines of “it doesn’t get any better than this” just as in, don’t hold out for getting a job or a girlfriend to improve your life, instead just really enjoy your coffee in the morning and friends and good nature. It’s easier said than done, I know, but I think there can be real value in focusing on the present. You don’t need to worry about the next five years just focus on the next five day— I find doing that helps clear a lot of fog for me.

Good luck, I hope your psych goes well?!
 
It's okay. Don't forget we're in the middle of a very severe pandemic since almost a year now and that the economic conditions we're in are similar to the ones of a war. Being stressed and depressed and incapable of doing anything, especially getting a job, is very normal. I felt similar to you for the entire year too, until the right combination of medication and short term goals and work on the present was reached. Not being able to read or watch anything new or unrelated to therapy still is a problem, and it's terrible because it makes me feel stupid.

I had very few social relationships and it's only now that a bit by chance I have nice people to discover. I try to deepen the ties rather than chattering, it takes time. It gives me something that is more than a distraction. I spend a lot of time trying to figure out my feelings by writing and reading. I also try to get rid of big stressing goals. I'm not going anywhere with the pandemic anyway, there just is no point in guilting myself for it on the top of it. I have mid term goals that are feasible.

Like tryptich said, more or less all that can be done in adverse conditions is to refocus on the present and things happening there. Eating, pets, mindful relationships. Cooking can be small little challenges.

I had a period of time that was so dark I couldn't think of anything further than the next 10 minutes. I wasn't wishing to die but it started to look like an option. Then I understood that I needed to have microscopic joys among all that suffering. I got incense sticks plants and a pet. I allowed myself to sleep more. I allowed myself to say f*ck to job applications. I removed any stressor I could. I made my boundaries with the people causing me distress stronger. Not perfect but just firmer.

And once things are emptied, you can fill it again. But clutter has to be removed. Also you're 24 and clearly is an age that is very affected by the pandemic, the fact you aren't getting a job right now probably doesn't have much to do with you but with the conditions of the market. It is TERRIBLE for all of us . It hasn't been that grim since 1929!! I have lost all my clients and am on benefits and helped by my family. At least it allows me to live nicely and I'm grateful just for that.

Don't lose hope. Hold on small things. Gradually regain some terrain. Discuss medication with your psych, I know personality disorders have a reputation of not responding well because maladaptive patterns are deeply embedded in your way of being, but still it does something in more difficult periods. Perhaps you can join an online DBT group? There are a few ones in the US that are affordable.

Good luck with everything! I hope this helped at least a little bit!
 
Hello all thank you!! I appreciate all of your responses!! I’ve been doing much better since I did the psych appointment. I also found a podcast that discusses Recovery from BPD that has helped so so so much. And the day after I wrote this I told my feelings to the person I was feeling them for, and they feel similarly :) for some reason doing that has enabled me to focus more on myself.

The psych appointment went soooo well, I’m back on a low dose of Geodon that I had stopped lol, it’s helping a lot I think. She uses multiple modalities so she sent me these planning documents for goals and assessments of my life and they helped so much. I’ve already started on them!

I feel motivated and much better again (if only my physical pains could get on board lol). I think i touched on the whole update? Lol. I’m even writing a little again!! Thank you!!
 
Very happy to hear you're doing better! Sometimes not much is required. And yes telling our truth rather than withholding it has a delicious release that makes us feel integrated and focused on what is important. Kudos for the progress. You can give yourself a large and affectionate pat on the back!
 
Thank you both!! The podcast is called "The Last Symptom (Of Borderline Personality Disorder)" I think the hosts name is Brian Barnett, he isn't professionally trained but he had BPD for I think 35 years and no longer has symptoms. I take some of it with a grain of salt but also, he's so so helpful and has an interesting perspective!
 
I just resisted this and I did better for a long while !! and I'm rereading all of y'all's advice and it's helping so much all over again. Focus on the present. On now. Not the next five years, the next five days or minutes. I got this. Thank you all.
 
Status
Not open for further replies.
Back
Top