Treading Dangerously?!

[The Albatross]

Ugh. Now I'm overthinking. Everyone is in a different place. This is not a recovery program like 12 step, or SMART, and there is not a prescribed set of unifying principles. The forum is beneficial because it is educational and peer support... but it is highly individualized and allows for different opinions (like the eternal debate over whether or not alcoholics, addicts and here PTSD's can ever recover). It is mutual aid, with some peer support. If there's any skill set materials here, they do not seem to be practices and discussed as a group.

Goal setting requires cognition, emotional regulation, and skill sets that can lead to decisions and actualizing actions... things that some of us PTSD's do not have or have to spend a lot of time to learn.

Blech. Don't know if I actually said what I wanted to say or not... but I tried at any rate.

 

[angel2write]

So, I guess what I am saying is that in my opinion little goals are fine so long as they are steps towards the bigger ultimate goal. The ultimate goal needs to be identified clearly or the steps lead to nowhere...

I think this is a good point and really answers what Nicolette was asking.

We have a "goal for the day" thread, but maybe we also need a "goal for the year" thread to go with it. Where do you want to be this time next year? What are you aiming for? And what steps are you taking to get there?

 

[intothelight]

Maybe starting threads that address specific goals should be done in PTSD Discussion so those that are in the same place can share ideas and support. This happens time to time, but it might be a good place to start those kinds of things.

We see similar threads in Chit Chat, but they are not PTSD specific and apply to both supports and sufferers.

Couldn't hurt to start some and see where they go....

 

[DharmaGirl]

I sometimes post in the goals thread. Now I'm afraid to.(Just joking) I make simple goals because I am really struggling with the PTSD, and MDD, and chronic back pain. I used to work 12 hour shifts and would feel the same way about others who didn't have much to do, then I decompensated. I've been cycling about every 2 months I just realized and getting up and leaving the house is huge for me. I hope to go back to work, but it is an escape for me where I don't have to look at my stuff. Maybe that is better, or maybe not working and working on my stuff is better.

 

[Nicolette]

Thanks for all your replies everyone.

All of the above makes sense and involves different perspectives, interpretations and opinions just as much as the questions did.

I just hope some sufferers will one day set themselves longer-termed goals as well as the day to day ones so that even if they do fall backwards they can eventually dust themselves off, get up and try again (heading towards something better) as no one deserves to suffer at the depths of depression for prolonged periods of time (years) where basic hygiene is a goal. That, to me, is beyond sad.

 

[Meadowsweet]

I think perhaps these things can be misread Nicollette, and misinterpreted. Not always, but as a generalisation.And though the symptoms of PTSD can be generalised against the diagnostic criteria, the materialisation of avoidence, for example, can surely be different in different people?

i've recently got a first class degree. That would be a great goal and a great achievement to lots of people. But I undertook that degee as an older student, because I'd been attacked again, and my response was to think that if I was a good girl and did well and all that, nothing like that would happen again.

So it was a big goal, but for unhealthy reasons.

I still have that anxiety of the need to constantly make everything look like it's all normal and ok to on-lookers.

But when I'm left by myself, with no onlookers, I struggle because my mind floods with unwanted crap.

I think as you understood in your response to Amethist's reply, just like supporters, PTSD sufferers can sometimes do the big stuff and then struggle to find energy for the little stuff. Hence the goals to do little stuff.

But if I can be blunt, it is never healthy to assume to understand where others are at from something as little as the goal for the day thread. But if you get the feeling that a person could strive for more, there is no harm in asking the individual further about where they are coming from.

 

[Nicolette]

Meadowsweet I explained my thinking and then asked questions to try and understand......

 

[Meadowsweet]

Meadowsweet I explained my thinking and then asked questions to try and understand......

Yes, I realise that. I wasn't trying to challenge you or anything.

Something my therapist says is that she is the expert in knowing therapy techniques etc, but I am the expert at knowing what is inside my mind.She will ask why I'm seeing something that way and let me explore it. She might ask me if there are other possibilities to how I'm seeing something. I think this is a healthy way of coming to understand others.

I appreciate that you are questioning the thoughts you have about why people do what they do. But I think it's healthier not to think too much about it, because it's not the kind of thing where there is one answer. If you got a hundred replies, it wouldn't give you the insight into person number 101.

I hope that makes sense.

 

[Loveneverfails]

I think I have to agree with Nicolette, not just with the forum but also with myself. There are times I have noticed I procrastinate or just don't feel like doing things. It's so much better than it was, I take it as progress with coping, but I used to feel accomplished simply for doing the dishes every now and again. Now if I don't do them at least once a day I feel disgusting. It was the best I could do at the time, but there were instances where I was enabling myself. Telling myself that was as good as I was ever gonna get. Obviously it wasn't true.

Nicolette is right. It's a very healthy thing to question your progress. To set achievable short term and long term goals and work toward them. It's also very healthy to have many side projects outside of work, friends and family- to develop your sense of self. It's so easy to let PTSD swallow your life and then find that the little things suddenly become so burdensome they're all you can manage to do. But there is so much more to life than that. I could be off base, but I think that may be some of what Nicolette is trying to get at. If you reach out for more of life than just the daily, even if you don't manage to do it all, life becomes a lot more fulfilling.

Anyway- I just wanted to say too that it's important to admit even just silently to yourself your own flaws. You can't fix what you won't admit is wrong. Stepping off the soap box now. Apologies if it rubs anyone the wrong way.

 

[Deleted member 1860]

LOL, yet another thread that i have yet to visit which has spurned a spin-off thread!

I don't post there, but I can see both sides of this. Sometimes I do consider it an accomplishment to simply take a shower for the day and get dressed. Of course, this is usually after a depressive episode that has lasted a number of days in which I don't get out of my pj's let alone take care of basic hygiene.

Just thinking though, that if it is a goal for the day, then these goals by definition can't be particularly grand, KWIM? I mean, I have a lot of long term goals such as get into a stable relationship, become independent and off of disability, go back to work, take classes, so on and so forth. But, none of these goals can be accomplished in a day. Of course, one could say their goal for the day is to meet new people, apply for a new job, or go to class, and of course they are mini-goals that need to be accomplished before the major goals can be met. But now I think I'm rambling.

I think that at times we all stagnate. But also, I think this is a necessary part of healing. Sometimes, not always. I mean, constantly pushing yourself forward is TOUGH! I realized yesterday that I need to just sit back and enjoy things as they are as I've come a long way in my healing. Of course, I can still improve, but at the same time I know I need to acknowledge how far I've come and simply LIVE as I could backslide next week and miss out on this awesome feeling. But I think that's not exactly what you're getting at.

 

[goingonhope]

I appreciate that you are questioning the thoughts you have about why people do what they do. But I think it's healthier not to think too much about it, because it's not the kind of thing where there is one answer. If you got a hundred replies, it wouldn't give you the insight into person number 101.

Well understood, and thank you for adding your input into this thread.

 

[Froggie]

I have to admit that I do go and post on the Goal for the day thread when I find myself being too down and in a stagnation rut. It's a public dare I give myself so that my ego will move it's arse and do something. Works most of the time for me to get my life back into a saner prospective. I can understand those who have to deal with the major depression period of PTSD - just getting out of bed is almost an Olympic defeat ! I remember when I was in that rut, rough as h*ll!