Depression, Anxiety, or other Mental Health Conditions

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Gemini73

PostRe: Depression, Anxiety, or other Mental Health Conditions
by Gemini73 » Wed Nov 14, 2018 2:31 pm

kerr9000 wrote:
Gemini73 wrote:I've an over the phone assessment next Thursday morning with a therapist. Had to change from this week due to work pattern.

Been in a pretty dark place these last few days. Earlier this moring was particularly bad.



Hope it goes well for you. I will be wishing you the best for it chap.


Cheers, kerr. I've been having a right time of it of recent, flipping between feeling very depressed or acting extremely aggressive with fewer moments, like now, of reasonable normalcy.

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Green Gecko
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PostRe: Depression, Anxiety, or other Mental Health Conditions
by Green Gecko » Wed Nov 14, 2018 6:54 pm

Got bounced back from local triage service a couple weeks ago after being recommended some paid for counselling specific to my neurological condition. I gave them so much information. Just "please do this, I now discharge you from my care. Take care." which was pretty gooseberry fool, I received literally nothing in terms of actionable support other than go here and get someone else to help. I even explained how this was not helpful the last time. I gave them the right to act on my behalf which is totally normal for my disability but the disability service recommend wouldn't accept a pro persona referral via an NHS triage nurse? What? That's like having to personally write to the surgeon when your hand has been smashed to pieces. Which just puts me back at square 1. It just happened again. What's the point of reaching out then? Spoke to the GP today (two weeks for a telephone appointment at a random time in the afternoon to sort out my broken perscription) and they were surprised so are writing to them that they should refer back to GP and they can put me on to an NHS psychiatrist if it is suitable (which in this case it is). They actually called me back to let me know they're doing that which is nice.

It's so easy to be served an exit velocity in this health system and then fired through it, leaving you stranded. I don't know why people have to fight so hard just to see a medical expert in the general field of "mental health", other than a GP, who can only do so much, generally prescribing medicine.

You know there's a problem when you get systematically very low level of support and people part of the same system (GP) are shocked at how bad it is. Months and months between anything resembling an intervention in response to a health problem or crisis. So hopefully I can speak to a psychiatrist again soon (it's been a few years) and try to find a solution for the issues that tumbled me into massive depression again about 6-8 weeks ago now that are rooted very early in my life and probably should have been sorted out in my teen years if not earlier when I first started feeling this way and self-harming.

Last edited by Green Gecko on Wed Nov 14, 2018 7:06 pm, edited 6 times in total.
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Gemini73

PostRe: Depression, Anxiety, or other Mental Health Conditions
by Gemini73 » Wed Nov 14, 2018 6:59 pm

While I feel a little better at having taken the logical step in regards to my mental health, I'm not entirely sure what to expect or where to begin when that phone call arrives. I will admit that I'm more than a little nervous about the whole thing.

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Green Gecko
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PostRe: Depression, Anxiety, or other Mental Health Conditions
by Green Gecko » Wed Nov 14, 2018 7:01 pm

It depends where you are in the country. Sometimes it's good, but with funding struggles at the moment it can feel really haphazard the type of support you get. Sorry to sound forboding.. but it's the truth. I have received some good help in the past but sometimes I go in feeling like I could cross the road and get hit and not care and after 3 weeks it's basically "you're fine, contact this charity and they will help you instead". I mean what is the NHS for? It's so sad, I really worry about the people who are literally dying all the time. I'm well aware of the pitfalls because my mum directed the local branch of Mind for 10 years and they basically pick up all this slack. People are literally dying and our health service is doing the bare minimum it is capable of doing with the funds it has to prevent a fraction of those occurrences.

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Gemini73

PostRe: Depression, Anxiety, or other Mental Health Conditions
by Gemini73 » Wed Nov 14, 2018 7:10 pm

Cheltenham and Gloucestershire area. Since making taking that first step the correspondence has been very good, but it's early days. I'm not entirely sure if being an NHS employee has maybe garnered me a little more attention than had I not been an NHS employee, (it wouldn't be the first time as I used my employment to fast track my father's hernia op last November), but we'll see. Regardless I've made that step and that's what matters.

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PostRe: Depression, Anxiety, or other Mental Health Conditions
by Green Gecko » Wed Nov 14, 2018 8:14 pm

I think it does make you feel better simply beating the self-stigma (and legit stigma) of seeking help. Feel less alone. It really isn't an uncommon or shameful thing, it's remarkable how poor our country's self perception of wellness is. Almost taking pride in things being gooseberry fool and soldiering on anyway.. until one day, bang.

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PostRe: Depression, Anxiety, or other Mental Health Conditions
by Tsunade » Wed Nov 14, 2018 8:31 pm

I've made another appointment to see my doctor about my anxiety again. Hopefully this time he doesn't just thrust another leaflet in my hands for CBT again, when I want proper councilling for it. I'd rather talk about why I have it and any underlying issues I have that causes me to have it, rather than just have CBT again.

I wanted to see the female doctor at the practice but she's always fully booked. She seems to be a lot more informative and helpful, the male doctor is old, can be a bit dotty at times and should have retired a while ago. He's been old for as long as I can remember. Last time I saw him he tried leading me down the CBT route again, which I know would be useless as it would have been with the same people from before and in a group. Fingers crossed this time he actually listens to what I say.

Ludo is gooseberry fool!
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Dowbocop
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PostRe: Depression, Anxiety, or other Mental Health Conditions
by Dowbocop » Tue Nov 20, 2018 8:20 am

I'm really struggling to let things go at the moment. Two anecdotes follow to prove what I'm talking about.

I took a blouse back to a shop at the weekend after they'd played silly buggers when my wife tried to return it the day before (they refused her over an absolutely tiny mark on it). I went to the manager and explained, but I asked him to give me a reason why it wasn't returnable instead of pointing out the tiny mark, as that would obviously prejudice his judgement. He immediately went completely on the defensive, and then accused me of being too defensive (terrible customer service by the by, I categorically was not rude to him, but I wasn't jumping for joy at having to make an extra trip to his shop to exercise my statutory rights - I have since put this down to my quite broad accent sometimes sounding a bit aggressive). Anyway, I got the refund and sorted it out with him, but I've had this nagging feeling end since that I should have called him out on how he spoke to me and his terrible attitude to conflict resolution.

Cut to yesterday, I'm at the front of the queue in a post office concession at the back of a card shop. People are queued up down the middle aisle in front of the middle window, when a girl walks up along the other aisle (i.e. in front of a different window). I say to her "Just so you know there's a queue, yeah?" Again, not rude, I've had it said to me before, I've said it to others before, she might have thought it was different queues, and sometimes there are valid reasons to nip in front. She then bit my head off and shouted "YEAH I'M NOT AN IDIOT I CAN SEE I'M JUST HANDING THESE IN!" I turn away, roll my eyes, but then this nagging feeling starts eating away at me that I shouldn't have to accept being spoken to that way, so I turn to her and say "Could you be a bit more polite please?" Obviously she immediately goes into one, and the next minute or so is a mixture of her going "DON'T EVEN START I'M NOT IN THE MOOD I'M NOT STUPID I COULD SEE THE QUEUE" and me going "I'm not calling you stupid I was just letting you know and then you were rude to me."

So, on their own, two not too bad, slightly boring stories yeah? However, my brain keeps churning the events around in my head with extra things I should've said to them, things I should've done differently, telling that manager not too talk over upset customers,the primal urge to grab that snotty cow's pack of letters and stuff them behind the Christmas card display. Bits of my brain go to the worst case scenario of me having a fight with her fella or her dad if she sees me in the street. It's absolutely crazy, it isn't going to happen, but I start imagining the situation if that came to pass (not that I'm particularly scared of having a ruck, but I don't think it's worth it at all). Underpinning it all is the irritating feeling that they think they are in the right or did a good job, when they actually didn't, and that really winds me up. I mentioned in the car thread that I had issues with this when I started driving and I nearly had an accident - yes I pulled out incorrectly, I'm a stupid learner, but you were bombing down a 20 road at 30 so who's the banana split? Obviously there's no resolution because I'm not going to get out of the car and front up to him, but it took a little bit of time for me to get over the minor slight he'd visited upon me.

I'm still wound up about it today, gooseberry fool's whirring around my brain and it stopped me getting off to sleep for a bit last night. I read it all back and it's totally laughable, but the anger is still poisoning my brain and it shouldn't be.

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Drumstick
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PostRe: Depression, Anxiety, or other Mental Health Conditions
by Drumstick » Tue Nov 20, 2018 8:47 am

Dowbocop wrote:...

Sadly this is the society of today. You are absolutely spot on that you shouldn't have to accept being spoken to like that.

I think in the first example, I personally would never have let the manager guy off without letting him know what was up. I recently had to go and tell off a guy in a coffee shop who was rude to my wife.

The second one, due to it being a packed post office I'm probably letting it go.

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Sandy
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PostRe: Depression, Anxiety, or other Mental Health Conditions
by Sandy » Tue Nov 20, 2018 2:46 pm

Tsunade wrote:I'd rather talk about why I have it and any underlying issues I have that causes me to have it, rather than just have CBT again.


Can you think of a specific reason for why you have it? If not it could just be your brains inability to generate and hold the required amount of seretonin. Are you taking medication at the moment?

Dowbocop wrote:I'm really struggling to let things go at the moment. Two anecdotes follow to prove what I'm talking about.


Not unreasonable reactions to find the scenarios frustrating but the feeling should subside faster than you're saying and you definitely don't want to be mulling over what ifs in your head.

It sounds like you basically get stuck in fight or flight mode. There are breathing exercises you can do to help reduce certain feelings and most areas have self-referal for help with these kinds of things. Alternatively you can go to your GP and they should be able to refer you.

There's no quick and instant fix though. Everything takes time.

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Tsunade
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PostRe: Depression, Anxiety, or other Mental Health Conditions
by Tsunade » Tue Nov 20, 2018 3:12 pm

Sandy wrote:
Tsunade wrote:I'd rather talk about why I have it and any underlying issues I have that causes me to have it, rather than just have CBT again.


Can you think of a specific reason for why you have it? If not it could just be your brains inability to generate and hold the required amount of seretonin. Are you taking medication at the moment?




I'm not on medication at the moment. I think having my medical condition and the stress of having it has been a key part to why I have my anxiety. The anxiety has definitely ramped up since I caught cellulitis and had to be sent to ICU with septaecemia in 2013.

Ludo is gooseberry fool!
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Sandy
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PostRe: Depression, Anxiety, or other Mental Health Conditions
by Sandy » Tue Nov 20, 2018 3:39 pm

Tsunade wrote:I'm not on medication at the moment. I think having my medical condition and the stress of having it has been a key part to why I have my anxiety. The anxiety has definitely ramped up since I caught cellulitis and had to be sent to ICU with septaecemia in 2013.


Sepsis isn't nice...sorry to hear you had it. I've read that mental health complaints are pretty common after sepsis, so it could definitely be that the two are linked. If you are able to take medication it might be something worth considering - there are a lot of scare stories but there are a lot more success stories.

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Dowbocop
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PostRe: Depression, Anxiety, or other Mental Health Conditions
by Dowbocop » Tue Nov 20, 2018 8:15 pm

Drumstick wrote:
Dowbocop wrote:...

Sadly this is the society of today. You are absolutely spot on that you shouldn't have to accept being spoken to like that.

I think in the first example, I personally would never have let the manager guy off without letting him know what was up. I recently had to go and tell off a guy in a coffee shop who was rude to my wife.

The second one, due to it being a packed post office I'm probably letting it go.


Thanks to you both for your answers, I needed to not be bantered off so I thought here was better than the annoyed thread :lol:

Oddly I'm the other way round. I felt that girl was way out of order for absolutely no reason and that's why I didn't let it lie. If you've listened to Adam Buxton's podcast when he talks about squeaky voice confrontation that's totally how I was feeling inside, although my voice wasn't breaking. I know enough about myself to know I'm much more likely to break down than lash out (although it can sometimes be closer than I'd like!), and I'd had a bad night's sleep and a difficult morning due to my son being under the weather so things kind of came together and it was the straw that broke the camel's back, especially when you bear in mind my shop experience previously and the fact that I was working through a mental worst case scenario with the post office worker.

I know the manager was at least trying to help and perhaps just didn't have the training (I did NHS Conflict Resolution and I found it really informative, and I feel it's made me better at dealing with difficult people). A part of me was keeping my eyes on the prize as well, because my objective was to get that blouse returned and I achieved it. If he'd shut down that was game over, so I bit my tongue.

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Dowbocop
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PostRe: Depression, Anxiety, or other Mental Health Conditions
by Dowbocop » Tue Nov 20, 2018 8:22 pm

Sandy wrote:
Not unreasonable reactions to find the scenarios frustrating but the feeling should subside faster than you're saying and you definitely don't want to be mulling over what ifs in your head.

It sounds like you basically get stuck in fight or flight mode. There are breathing exercises you can do to help reduce certain feelings and most areas have self-referal for help with these kinds of things. Alternatively you can go to your GP and they should be able to refer you.

There's no quick and instant fix though. Everything takes time.

I looked on the internet at positive thinking articles, but the phrase "maybe it's the Virgo in me" just made me angrier :lol:

There were some useful points that worked for a time, but the thoughts just crept back in later. I have to take my son to the GP tomorrow so I might have a chat with them about it. I got referred to a telephone appointment just over a year ago but they didn't really give me any formal help as I didn't score highly enough on the test.

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PostRe: Depression, Anxiety, or other Mental Health Conditions
by Rocsteady » Tue Nov 20, 2018 8:54 pm

Taking up boxing really helped me when I was in an angry phase of my life. It really helps mentally as you can stay calm much easier knowing you have a better handle on the situation in the extremely unlikely event of her fella kicking off or whatever. Plus it’s great venting and gives you better physical control of your body.

Would recommend, only needs to take up an hour a week.

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Dowbocop
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PostRe: Depression, Anxiety, or other Mental Health Conditions
by Dowbocop » Tue Nov 20, 2018 10:08 pm

Rocsteady wrote:Taking up boxing really helped me when I was in an angry phase of my life. It really helps mentally as you can stay calm much easier knowing you have a better handle on the situation in the extremely unlikely event of her fella kicking off or whatever. Plus it’s great venting and gives you better physical control of your body.

Would recommend, only needs to take up an hour a week.

I've been doing Ju-Jitsu for the past fifteen years so like I said, I'm not particularly afraid of a violent confrontation, but it is always the worst outcome. I did actually feel much better after my session last night, although in general we don't do as much sparring/competitive grappling as we used to which is a bit frustrating as I always loved it.

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Sandy
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PostRe: Depression, Anxiety, or other Mental Health Conditions
by Sandy » Tue Nov 20, 2018 10:21 pm

Dowbocop wrote:
Sandy wrote:I looked on the internet at positive thinking articles, but the phrase "maybe it's the Virgo in me" just made me angrier :lol:

There were some useful points that worked for a time, but the thoughts just crept back in later. I have to take my son to the GP tomorrow so I might have a chat with them about it. I got referred to a telephone appointment just over a year ago but they didn't really give me any formal help as I didn't score highly enough on the test.


Yeah, there's some proper hippy shite out there but good stuff as well. There's an app called headspace that does what is effectively meditation without all the bollocks. Many people are sceptical but are often surprised by the results.

You just have to lie on those forms if you want to get seen; especially if you're all round pretty down to earth and sane. Your rational brain might say there's got to be people out there that are worse off than you so you might think you're probably only really a 6 out of 10 compared to them. Often your perception of how bad you are might be showing yourself a positive bias anyway so up what you'd normally go with by a point or two and you should get over the threshold.

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Green Gecko
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PostRe: Depression, Anxiety, or other Mental Health Conditions
by Green Gecko » Wed Nov 21, 2018 1:05 am

Bad experiences with shops completely strawberry float me up and ruin my day when I'm anxious.

I'll just copy and paste a review. If I get bad customer service they should know and I don't think that's unfair. I'm very rarely rude but will be outspoken when I'm well if I feel someone is being gooseberry fool at their job, because they need the feedback to survive. Why not? For what it's worth, my business has 5 star reviews even when I've strawberry floated stuff up or severely delayed it (often due to my health) because I'm honest about my failures and listen to complaints properly. The idea that considering that something maybe wasn't handled well is non-reproachable is total nonsense and in my opinion these people are weak, a blight on society, and they inherently cannot succeed in the long run because they are simply bad people.

Nothing wrong with the products or shop itself; sadly I felt service was bristly, hurried and patronising this time, even with the shop literally empty. Friendly conversation I regularly enjoy with arts & crafts shopkeepers, such as over the simple decisions like colour accuracy and knit that are paramount for me, instead felt argumentative despite myself not disagreeing with a single thing the clerk had to say. While this knowledge would normally be very valuable, reference material for a brand match albeit averagely printed on a business class Epson from the brand's website (as I knew was the case) was assumed to be completely wrong and it felt like instruction was being given instead of listening to customer's viewpoint, disregarding the experience they are quite likely to have. When I was instead agreeing, the chatter was seemingly interpreted as impinging on the clerk or (I hope not) the owner's authority on the matter, when this is just normal customer whataboutery, who want's to make the right decision for their end customer, as in this case. Therefore implying that the customer's "eye"s do not know what they are seeing, and neither do their colour names mean anything. Unnecessarily combative and kurt. That indecision could be calmly assuaged not brushed off. I don't believe even a thank you was given in the very fast, 2 minute transaction, after which I very much wanted to just leave. Just not friendly at all and really put me off going back for my local custom apparel business. Must have caught them in a bad mood as I normally enjoy taking my time and picking up a few extra things instead of being lectured about basic colour theory. I'll update my review if I go back and don't feel the same way. Even the most established craft suppliers need to understand that in this day and age shopping experience is 100% of the sale and politeness goes a long way. The newly situated Tashtori - next door - who I've been a patron of since it was "Jevoncraft 2" on Station Street some 20 years ago is much better.

Yeah, gotten to. I find it really hard to deal with boisterous, cunty individuals who don't really want to help, or "help" in such an authoritative and slightly aggressive manner that it just sounds like they're trying to make you strawberry float off - even when you agree with them, or aren't disagreeing with them. It's weird how some people assert "service" in a shop environment. Just the wrong kind of character maybe, or someone who would be better as a boss or manager than a customer-facing person. Specifically, managers, I've spoken to some on the phone etc. and sometimes they really do help resolve the situation and other times they can be incredibly rude and say the most outlandish things, even mocking you (my arguments were once described as "weak" by a really bad one after-which I literally felt like splitting my head open, also implying I was lying about my disability!!!) to again make you go away and feel shitty about yourself for daring to make an enquiry or complaint. How do these people have jobs?

Sandy wrote:It sounds like you basically get stuck in fight or flight mode. There are breathing exercises you can do to help reduce certain feelings and most areas have self-referal for help with these kinds of things. Alternatively you can go to your GP and they should be able to refer you.

Pretty much this, except at my worst I'd call this "flight or fright" because you can't really fight someone. Worrying about that gooseberry fool all day strawberry floating sucks. You end up reflecting negatively on yourself, why aren't I coping with this? Why is this bothering me so much? Why can't I just get on with this gooseberry fool like everyone else etc. When really you've just encountered a twat and you have no way of conceiving how this is not your fault because you are, well, probably better than them. Sometimes it's as simple as that person you've interacted with is a massive knob and the only positive step forward is to forget about that strawberry float and move on to something that actually matters and hope you don't see them again. Even if that isn't true it's better than getting super ill because some person was a dick to you. And they have no way of knowing that a simple day to day interaction for them is ruining someone else's day, they can't and won't understand because they strawberry floating suck.

Here's a visualisation exercise I sort of developed. If you're really fuming about someone being a banana split, or remembering an instance over and over again of some bad interpersonal experience, picture that person standing and staring blankly back at you, while you're mad about that gooseberry fool they said or did or whatever (because this is effectively what your mind is doing, wasting all your energy and emotions on this person that isn't even there and doesn't mean gooseberry fool to you). Then say to that person, "yeah you, you strawberry float, strawberry float right off. strawberry float off out of here. Through the door, there you go. Through that door right there out of my brain. strawberry float OFF." Picture them actually going out the door, and closing it behind them. They're gone, and they're not welcome back.

After repeating that a couple of times, finding some distractions, and breathing, my anxiety about someone or something like that goes away. And I have to repeat it, over and over again for recurring traumas, but eventually the bad memories lessen. And over time I get better at doing it for different people who hack me off. I get better at framing this as just some thoughts and feelings (this comes with mindfulness practice as well). These are just brain informations evoking a psychological response which is disproportionate. Robbing you of the energy you need to pursue your goals. I'm talking about people who don't or shouldn't matter in your life. Family, friends etc. it might be different.

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Dowbocop
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PostRe: Depression, Anxiety, or other Mental Health Conditions
by Dowbocop » Fri Nov 23, 2018 1:27 pm

Gecko - you're right about not being able to control encounters with twats. This week I've had two bad customer service experiences, a row with a stranger, and had to deal with a vomitty 1 year old, including trying and failing to get a urine sample three times :x Looking back I think most people would have had a bad time of it in fairness.

I did speak to the GP in the end. She agreed that how I was feeling wasn't normal. She pointed me towards a lot of services (including Headspace which I started yesterday) and said to come and see her in a few weeks (i.e. before Christmas). Might give either kick boxing or regular boxing a go as well - bit of a new challenge for me.

Many thanks to everyone for the advice and support :)

Gemini73

PostRe: Depression, Anxiety, or other Mental Health Conditions
by Gemini73 » Sun Dec 02, 2018 1:50 am

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Last edited by Gemini73 on Sun Dec 02, 2018 8:58 am, edited 1 time in total.

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