Take Me Seriously
Originally posted @ http://scruffy-duck.net
You know what I hate most about my mental health ‘problems‘ sometimes? It’s not the misery, the depression, the self harm, the self hate, the paranoia or the hundred other little symptoms I suffer from on odd occasions, it’s the complete inability to do anything that I seem to have.
It’s how time just disappears.
It’s not just the lack of motivation that causes this, I think it’s a combination of that, plus a lack of time organisation, and just this mentality I have of just not doing things. Or not doing the right things. And then time just disappears, I get up, and suddenly it’s bedtime again and I’ve done nothing without even realising it sometimes. A lot of the time.
And I don’t do it on purpose, and it’s not procrastination (though, I’m good at that too), it’s just one of those things that feels just out of my reach sometimes. I could do it, I want to do it, but then, I don’t.
I have a lot of time on my hands, but I accomplish very little. Do very little. There is a lot of sitting in my life.
Which I think is why mental health problems don’t always get treated seriously. Or at least why mine don’t. There is a lot of sitting in my life, but while a lot of it is down to this combination of de-motivation and time anomalies, a lot of it is due to some seriously disabling symptoms.
The anxiety for one. The anxiety is painfully disabling. I can’t get out of bed, I can’t move, I shake. I’m breathing like, like I know all of the oxygen on the planet is almost gone and I’m desperately trying to get it all before I run out and I die. A new thing is, when the anxiety is really bad, I want to cry. And I don’t cry much, outside of hormone-related time frames, but when I’m really panicking, it’s like the anxiety and fear fills me up, starting at my stomach, moving upwards, until it’s spilling out of my eyes. And then I get anxious about crying too, cause I don’t like crying much, less so in public, and of course, I’m more anxious in public. Not always, but usually.
The worst is when I wake up anxious. And not because of a dream, just because for that day, I start the day panicking, over nothing, over everything. It’s hard to know for sure, I’m not even sure you can know what you’re panicking about when you’re barely away in the morning. But it’s there and I’m hiding under my duvet, and screaming into my pillow, begging for it all to go away, please, please, please.
On rare occasions, that works.
The depression, the misery, involves a lot of sitting too. Whether in the morning or in the evening. Sometimes I get up in the morning, and spend half an hour just sitting on my bed, in pyjamas, in silence and staring, my mind half empty, half black, until I realise I’ve just been sitting there and really need to move. If only because I need to eat/drink/pee. That happens a lot, just the sitting in silence and metaphorical darkness, until I’m thirsty or hungry, and attributes somewhat to time disappearing.
Strangely, when, I am that so very miserable, I don’t even want to cry. I don’t want to move. I want to sleep more, but can’t get to sleep (it’s a weird vicious cycle I get stuck in sometimes). I don’t want to eat, clean (myself or the flat), the whole notion of taking care of myself tends to get thrown out window. Except, I really don’t have the energy or motivation to get up and open the metaphorical window, so the notion gets thrown to the floor with all the other rubbish. And then my flat becomes an assault course, and it would be easier to tidy it, then navigate it, but I don’t.
I don’t. It’s not I won’t or I can’t, cause I can, eventually I will and I do. I just don’t.
I remember a doctor telling me once that really bad states of depression mean that you can’t look toward the future, and described as having this black wall in the mind. And sometimes it’s like that, like there is a black wall between me and the jobs/activities I need or want to do. For example, I’ll step over some rubbish on my floor, and it doesn’t even occur to me to clear it up. There is a biro on my floor, that I’ve stepped on three or four times, and I haven’t picked it up. It occurred to me once, but since then, not a thing.
Then of course, there is another black wall between the thought and the actual action. Because when my kitchen is really bad, and I have no plates, I’m always thinking ‘I should wash up,’ but I don’t. And it’s not like I think ‘I’ll do it later,‘ I don’t. I think I should do the washing up and then carry on with whatever I went into the kitchen for.
It’s a bit like:
Problem | Thought | Action
I often wonder if I’ve always been like this. I’m not sure. Perhaps not at this intensity, and it all comes across as laziness. So I’ve always been lazy.
Maybe that’s right, maybe I’m just lazy and miserable, and there’s nothing else wrong with me.
Except the anxiety. Oh and the bouts of OCD, and the addictive personality. And the obsessive nature. And the paranoia, and the insomnia. The self harm, and pica, the problems I have with my identity, and the other random crap that passes through my head on a daily basis.
Taking me seriously yet? Or do I have to be on a ward, or overdosing?
Share|
You know what I hate most about my mental health ‘problems‘ sometimes? It’s not the misery, the depression, the self harm, the self hate, the paranoia or the hundred other little symptoms I suffer from on odd occasions, it’s the complete inability to do anything that I seem to have.
It’s how time just disappears.
It’s not just the lack of motivation that causes this, I think it’s a combination of that, plus a lack of time organisation, and just this mentality I have of just not doing things. Or not doing the right things. And then time just disappears, I get up, and suddenly it’s bedtime again and I’ve done nothing without even realising it sometimes. A lot of the time.
And I don’t do it on purpose, and it’s not procrastination (though, I’m good at that too), it’s just one of those things that feels just out of my reach sometimes. I could do it, I want to do it, but then, I don’t.
I have a lot of time on my hands, but I accomplish very little. Do very little. There is a lot of sitting in my life.
Which I think is why mental health problems don’t always get treated seriously. Or at least why mine don’t. There is a lot of sitting in my life, but while a lot of it is down to this combination of de-motivation and time anomalies, a lot of it is due to some seriously disabling symptoms.
The anxiety for one. The anxiety is painfully disabling. I can’t get out of bed, I can’t move, I shake. I’m breathing like, like I know all of the oxygen on the planet is almost gone and I’m desperately trying to get it all before I run out and I die. A new thing is, when the anxiety is really bad, I want to cry. And I don’t cry much, outside of hormone-related time frames, but when I’m really panicking, it’s like the anxiety and fear fills me up, starting at my stomach, moving upwards, until it’s spilling out of my eyes. And then I get anxious about crying too, cause I don’t like crying much, less so in public, and of course, I’m more anxious in public. Not always, but usually.
The worst is when I wake up anxious. And not because of a dream, just because for that day, I start the day panicking, over nothing, over everything. It’s hard to know for sure, I’m not even sure you can know what you’re panicking about when you’re barely away in the morning. But it’s there and I’m hiding under my duvet, and screaming into my pillow, begging for it all to go away, please, please, please.
On rare occasions, that works.
The depression, the misery, involves a lot of sitting too. Whether in the morning or in the evening. Sometimes I get up in the morning, and spend half an hour just sitting on my bed, in pyjamas, in silence and staring, my mind half empty, half black, until I realise I’ve just been sitting there and really need to move. If only because I need to eat/drink/pee. That happens a lot, just the sitting in silence and metaphorical darkness, until I’m thirsty or hungry, and attributes somewhat to time disappearing.
Strangely, when, I am that so very miserable, I don’t even want to cry. I don’t want to move. I want to sleep more, but can’t get to sleep (it’s a weird vicious cycle I get stuck in sometimes). I don’t want to eat, clean (myself or the flat), the whole notion of taking care of myself tends to get thrown out window. Except, I really don’t have the energy or motivation to get up and open the metaphorical window, so the notion gets thrown to the floor with all the other rubbish. And then my flat becomes an assault course, and it would be easier to tidy it, then navigate it, but I don’t.
I don’t. It’s not I won’t or I can’t, cause I can, eventually I will and I do. I just don’t.
I remember a doctor telling me once that really bad states of depression mean that you can’t look toward the future, and described as having this black wall in the mind. And sometimes it’s like that, like there is a black wall between me and the jobs/activities I need or want to do. For example, I’ll step over some rubbish on my floor, and it doesn’t even occur to me to clear it up. There is a biro on my floor, that I’ve stepped on three or four times, and I haven’t picked it up. It occurred to me once, but since then, not a thing.
Then of course, there is another black wall between the thought and the actual action. Because when my kitchen is really bad, and I have no plates, I’m always thinking ‘I should wash up,’ but I don’t. And it’s not like I think ‘I’ll do it later,‘ I don’t. I think I should do the washing up and then carry on with whatever I went into the kitchen for.
It’s a bit like:
Problem | Thought | Action
I often wonder if I’ve always been like this. I’m not sure. Perhaps not at this intensity, and it all comes across as laziness. So I’ve always been lazy.
Maybe that’s right, maybe I’m just lazy and miserable, and there’s nothing else wrong with me.
Except the anxiety. Oh and the bouts of OCD, and the addictive personality. And the obsessive nature. And the paranoia, and the insomnia. The self harm, and pica, the problems I have with my identity, and the other random crap that passes through my head on a daily basis.
Taking me seriously yet? Or do I have to be on a ward, or overdosing?
Share|