Your right with exactly what you say! Whats makes it worse is the good days and bad days. When the bad day comes you feel a complete failure, well i do anyway Everything you achieved just disappears
Joined: Sep 30, 2004 Posts: 758 Location: United Kingdom
Posted: Fri Oct 15, 2004 12:00 am Post subject:
Stinks doesn't it. My brain seems to have a default setting of negative and therefore being positive just takes so much effort. Especially if depressed which just drains me of energy making it about 1 million times harder.
This is what annoys me when people say 'just be positive'. 'look on the bright side' AHHH! I'm not completely thick. Of course they are right but to constantly, every waking second, of every minute, of every hour consciously analyse what I'm thinking and force myself into a positive mind set is not easy. From the moment I wake I force myself to wash, get dressed, eat something and then.....well then I have to motivate myself to step outside the door (not always successful), deal with the fear and paranoia when I'm out (not to mention the sweating, hot flushes, nausea etc), force myself into the shop (shops if I'm feeling brave), deal with the cashier (Hi can seem like such a long word sometimes) and then the journey back home. Just when you think it's safe....mum calls!
Maybe I'm just a wimp but this is alot of mental exertion for me. What do I get for my troubles....a pint of milk YAY! Someone once said to me 'think of social situations as a hurdle to overcome' I know it's a hurdle! I've been jumping them for the past ten years! HMPH.
I heard the other day someone had a phobia of baked beans. I could quite happily live life without facing a baked bean but people? They're everywhere damn it.
Anyway I didn't mean to go on so long. What I really wanted to say is from now on if I have a good day I'm going to celebrate. Like a birthday except hopefully more common. I'll send myself a happy Goodday card, buy a cake (chocolate), a few drinks, invite some imaginary friends round and not wake up in the morning with a girl I don't know. Oh and make a badge, can't forget the badge.
Also I found a quote from Ted Hughes you might like:
'Do not Pick up the Telephone'
Death invented the phone it looks like the altar of death
Do not worship the telephone
It drags its worshippers into actual graves
With a variety of devices, through a variety of disguised voices
Will try to find if there's more, feels a bit unfinished to me.
Take care
your posts really amaze me! i know most of what i read on this site I can relate to but the way you write yours exactly fit my feelings. i agree with every single part of your post! I love the way you add the humour too, thats talent
the quote does not seemed finished to me either
i know how stressful it can be, talking with your mum. i like my own space, i suppose to think about things and my day, not wise but still. my family are always around, it hard to escape. after a while though it can get lonely. my mums very over protective and even wants to know why i go to my room if im there a while. ill just say nothing, but then when i feel ready to join the family again, i find it hard as i cut myself off. persevere ringing your mum. at least it keeps the day going, even though she may ask awkward questions.
im at home with my mum every day and she may occasionally say: im going to post a letter, want to come? im not joking, the post box is four houses away from mine!! what do i do, panic, 'go out', i cant go out, so many things go through my mind, what time of day is it?-how many people will be around? are any neighbours out? is what im wearing ok? etc. despite all this what do i say, no. i cant even post a letter. i often need to know things a certain period of time before, to plan, not too long though or i panic and dont go through with it. i can never do things on the spare of the moment. sorry ive sort of gone off the point but i just wanted to agree that it takes so much effort mentally to do simple things
Joined: Sep 30, 2004 Posts: 758 Location: United Kingdom
Posted: Mon Oct 18, 2004 3:24 pm Post subject:
going off the point is great ! It's how natural coversation happens. Our minds are so terrified about saying the right thing all the time it does us good to give them a little freedom and let them wonder. Thinking and writing on the spur of the moment you might say.
Especially when I can relate to what you say. Those kind of thoughts go through my mind as well when I go out. As for your mum, yeah everyone needs their own space. This is something we all SP or not go through. It's a natural process of growing up. Doesn't make it less annoying though. For years the only time my mum saw me was to get food, grunt and disappear back to my room. Glad you still join them now and again, I think it's important we don't isolate ourselves completely.
Your mum sounds like she really loves you. How do you think she would react if she found out you were SP? Maybe if she understood you better she might be able to help? Not that I'm trying to pressure you, I know how hard it can be. I'm just curious what you think. I know you said before your parents have a negative attitude to mental health problems. But maybe if they understood what SP is they might realise you're not 'mental' but the same person you have always been. I'm sorry if I seem to go on about it, the last thing I want to do is push you away. I just don't want you to suffer this alone. Promise I won't go on about it again!
I must say ive never been the classic teenager to live out of my room, maybe because of my mum being concerned if i went there in the 1st place! i think she thought i had something to hide as she couldnt see what i was doing. now im older she doesnt make me come out my room but still tries to find out what im doing. i only go to my room for about 10 minutes to have a think sometimes. i have spent the last two years living out of our tiny study due to my A levels, maybe thats the equivalent. i guess i struggled, what with worrying about peoples perception of my marks, i aways kept going to my best, staying up to the early hours of the morning and stuff. maybe that helped contribute to my phobia, not talking to people for so long and being isolated. ive always been shy but the last two years is when it got real bad! Also, my brother gets brilliant marks for EVERYTHING so there is a lot of comparison. sorry about that!
Im really not sure how my mum woulds react if i told her i had SP. i dont know whether she would think im serious to be honest. if i managed to convince her, i dont think she would feel comfortable about it. I really dont know, its quite unpredictable.
if i join the site i will have to give my email address, thats got to have some links to my computer? wont it? for example, every time i visit the site it goes in your search history, joins the cookies folder and the temporary internet files. i delete all of these after each visit to the site? obssessive i no! i still worry that there are others ways of tracing this?? My brother is really good with computers and often alters the settings etc.
maybe i could make up a name to post on my guest posts, so that people know which guest i am, it must be annoying for people not to know who they are talking to. that still scares me though. what would i do with all the other posts ive written, they will still remain as someone else. anyway i wouldnt know what to have as my name!
Joined: Sep 30, 2004 Posts: 758 Location: United Kingdom
Posted: Tue Oct 19, 2004 5:36 pm Post subject:
I'm never writing to you again if you don't join.... only kidding.
Lets make a pact. From now on when we talk to each other, we never apologise about what we write..deal?
As for computers I don't know anything. They send one e-mail to confirm your nickname and password and that's it. You can let them send you mail to say someone's replied to a thread etc but you don't have to. So there is no difference between being a member or guest apart from receiving one initial e-mail. Once you delete that (which you seem good at) you are home and dry!
I'm not very good at picking usernames but you can think of something in time. Guest names work for some but anyone can say they're anyone. Either way it's what you feel comfy with that counts. I have this image of you now sitting at the computer in a large trench coat wearing fake glasses and moustache Seriously I'm sad to hear it's so difficult for you to post here it must just make things tougher.
Would it help if I gave you my e-mail or would you still be paranoid about being found out? I'm not to comfy giving out an e-mail but if it would help I will do.
Either way take care and well done completing your A-levels I never got past Christmas on two attempts. Can I ask what subjects you did? I did Art & Design, Maths and Psychology the first time, then changed Maths for Photography.
ill try not to say sorry, i just looked back at a few messages and i didnt know i wrote it so much, so for the last time, i hope, i truly am sorry about that. and you have nothing to worry about either because i do value everything you say
its ok, theres no need for you to give out your email address on the internet, thanks alot though posting like this and reading has helped me alot already (even if not exactly in the real world) i think ill carry on like this for a while. Although i read all the posts here and everyones friendly, the more i get to know someone the harder it gets for me because i get scared of the responsibility of committment to that person. i would hate to let them down. then i get more nervous every time i see that person. if someone likes my personality at a quick glance and talks to me, i just get anxious that the more they find out about me they wont like me anymore. now though, no one even tries to talk to me. somehow, im trying to improve before i get my job! one day i hope!
i still dont understand how you seemed to recognise my post. im curious, what do i write like?! i know if your name wasnt at the top i could probably tell you because of you good humour but i dont have that.
i think this SP must be awful for you because you seriously are a fantastic person, its hard to imagine you have SP. i think you deal with it great that you can laugh about it alot. or is that your way to cover some of your feelings? do you show your humour to others? i know though from coming here that other people make me laugh about the silly things we do sometimes and that helped me too, sometimes i do laugh at myself now. i know just by saying it, it wont cure all your fears, but for what its worth i think that people will love your personality and you should not be afraid at all.
For my A levels, i took Psychology, Biology, Geography and Business Studies but only took Psy, Bio and Geo on to the full A level. may i ask why you didnt complete yours? was it the SP or for other reasons? I didnt know you could take a photography A level, its better than Maths though, thats hard!! i cant draw but i envy those that can! Psychology is how i spotted my problem. we only touched on it but i went further. every single thing on the websites meant something to me even if it was a little. it doesnt seem to me that i fall under a category of mental illness, i suppose sometimes i do feel crazy but more just like a freak. Anyway, it was a lot of relief to know that i wasnt suffering alone, not that i wish anyone to feel like this.
Joined: Sep 30, 2004 Posts: 758 Location: United Kingdom
Posted: Wed Oct 20, 2004 3:09 pm Post subject:
Hello to you to Guezza!,
I'm glad we can now correspond without fear of offending each other or thinking we will be received badly.
I get worried about about peole finding my 'true self' and rejecting it. Especially as I can be quite bitter and miserable. Humour? You're a sweetheart/top bloke (delete as applicable) and I'm glad you are able to find some things to laugh about. For me it's a mixture of wanting to please others, covering up, but most of all I just want to be happy. I worry if people get to know me better I am constantly under pressure to amuse them. What if I fail to make them laugh, will they still like me? There is no escape!
As for how I guessed it was you. I'm not sure. I've had a re-read of your posts and have a few ideas. First I noticed you changed Hi to Hello, is this deliberately? Honestly at the time it was the greeting that first caught my attention, God knows why, almost everyone says "Hi XXXXX!,". Also you said you've read my posts and knew my age. Apart from making me paranoid, I thought surely this detail would only be remembered by someone who I had directly written to. The more I had written directly to them the greater the likelihood of remembering my details. This my friend made you the prime suspect (maybe that could be your pseudonym)
Now for the more ambiguous evidence. (Hee Hee I feel like Miss Marple now ) We all write from a personal standpoint, therefore we all leave traces of our character in our posts. We are all made up from the same emotions, what makes us unique is the precise balance/degree of each emotion. When you write, you seem to be very thoughtful, apologetic, express your SP in a way that isn't too depressed and always inject some hope and goodwill to others. Now we all do this to some extent but it is the balance with which you do that makes us unique. Like a mental fingerprint or signature. Not to mention grammer, punctuation, sentence structure etc
This is not something that can be measured exactly but on a subconscious level, i.e. Gut Feeling, I thought you 'sounded' familiar. Hope this helps.
As for my A-levels, yeah it was SP. It really kicked in after I left school. Unlike many here I enjoyed school on the whole. There were bad times but for most of it I had quite a few friends and was relatively popular. Whisper this quietly, but to some degree I was one of the 'cool' people. And yes it was because I could make peole laugh. How the mighty fall .
Enough of me for now, what do want to do career wise. If you weren't SP and could do anything you want. Now back to me I would love to make computer games, shame I let people convince me it wasn't a serious career choice.
Anyway, as always I wish you well and hope you post again
i was afraid you may feel pressured to amuse people. i hope that i have not contributed to this. i dont want you to feel that you always have to add humour to a post because im sure myself and many other people would still like you for the kindness, support, and understanding that you achieve when posting. It appears that your humour is very natural so your attempt at covering up works. i think deep down though you do enjoy the humour even though you feel that you continuously have to entertain everyone, thats the phobia talking. everyone can be miserable now and again. im fairly sad right now to be honest. everyday waking up without a job, i sort of feel lost and deserted, like i have nothing to live for. i wish that the phone would just ring, as much as i fear the phone, an interview and even going to work. i hate to admit it but i sort of cant be bothered to apply for jobs because i know i wont get them. i feel so lazy.
im female, if you were wondering
about recognising my post! the 'hi' and 'hello' were not completely deliberate. i just thought i would greet someone differently because i always said the same thing. i didnt realise when or how i had done it. i didnt mean to make you paranoid! thanks for the detailed account, maybe im just bad at analysing others people writing.
sorry to hear the SP affected your A levels and got worse. throughout my A levels mine got worse, i didnt feel like going because every few minutes whether someone looked at me, someone moved an object, i would feel my heart beating fast and when someone spoke, it began really pounding etc. i thought if i didnt go though, people would judge me again, i didnt want to be the person that bunked school, i felt that my SP would get worse. i suppose leaving sixth form was a hard choice but your phobia answered it for you. since ive left though, it seemed to relieve some of my fears. only when i go to work i hope it doesnt completly go back the way things were or i wont have made any progress At least you have some relatively good times to remember at school, and being one of the 'cool' people, thats something to be proud of, ive never been there. i suppose that added to the pressure you felt though.
my career, thats awkward! i've never known what i wanted to do. its so frustrating. i have a small idea now though, i think it only really developed because of finding out about SP, and psychology. i started to get the feeling that i wanted to help others, those with disabilites, mental health problems the eldery etc, especially SP and eating disorders -so many people think they do it for attention and selfish reasons when no one truly understands unless its them. just like it is for us to avoid anxiety, and then for it to increase the next time presented with the same situation, you can start to lose weight, feel good about it and it can be an obessive routine that your scared to break. you cant help the way you feel about your body. i just really sympathise with this. as we know many people dont connect to mentally ill people and class them as a different sort of species. i really feel that i want to help these people with their problems as i would listen and take them seriously. 2 things wrong with this though. 'us' and many others are scared to seek professional help. then the main problem, i cant help myself so how can i attempt to help others anyway, i would have needed to go to uni and i dont think that i would have coped with that mentally and the fact that i struggle with studying aswell. I bet you didnt expect or want to here all that what is you opinion to other mental disorders?
i can see where people are coming from, computer games are not the most common job, someone does it though and i imagine it has good money too. if thats what you enjoy then thats what you should do. people feel it probably isnt a stable job, unusual etc, but go for it if you think your brave enough. i dont know how you get into making computer games though
Joined: Sep 30, 2004 Posts: 758 Location: United Kingdom
Posted: Fri Oct 22, 2004 11:35 pm Post subject:
Hello again,
I'm not to bad anymore with the humour thing. Friends should be there during the good and bad times. If they just want to be amused they can damn well pay me I seem to feeling quite positive lately, like the world should worry about me rejecting them for a change. Doesn't last when I get outside and see the whites of their eyes though Oh well, spose somethings better than nothing.
I don't want you to think I analyse or scrutinise every post to get some psychological profile ! No, I just had a gut feeling about most of it. Only when you asked how I guessed did I go over your posts and try to understand why I felt it. Please don't get paranoid! Don't worry I wasn't, merely curious.
I'm sorry to hear you are feeling so bad about not working. Hey if we're talking lazy - I woke up at 4pm the other day! Beat that . I just thought of some ideas...Have you heard of connexions? they help 13 - 19 year olds find work. Check their web site if you fall into that age category, I think they could really help. Also Modern Apprenticeships? Millenium Volunteers could be great for experience and confidence. Connexions an MV are really helping and would be really understanding. Connexions provide a service which is catered around the client’s needs and as well as providing career help they might be a great support in helping you overcome SP. You can just tell your family they are helping you find work so you shouldn’t worry about them finding about your SP.
Helping others is a very noble cause. Far cooler than being a self-centered, shallow, greedy narcissist which seems to be all the rage today. You sound cooler to me than I or any of my friends ever were.
It’s not uncommon for those who have had problems to want to help others. It could be a great source of confidence and self-worth too. How can you help others if you can’t help yourself ? You would be surprised how much strength you can find if someone else needs you. Also many social work type places encourage if not require work and study so its not too late for Uni if you ever feel brave enough.
I hope if this is what you want you can find a way in. Maybe try looking at local charities for experience etc. Remember this field of work is about helping people so they should be very understanding and supportive of you. Helping the homeless could be a good start as many, too many are homeless due to mental health problems. Also charities are usually desperate for help as it is often unpaid or if at all paid poorly. It also looks very good on your CV and can give you ‘transferable skills’ for future employment.
No I didn’t expect what you wrote but I’m glad you did. I hope you write more in the future too. As for my opinions of other mental health disorders? I’ve written too much already…..suffice it to say unlike many ‘normal’ people I believe in true equality. What has happened in the past and to some extent now, horrifies me. I guess it is the final excuse for classing someone as sub-human, mental illness
But that is another post altogether.
Take care, may life treat you well. You deserve it.
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Everything you achieved just disappears
I love the way you add the humour too, thats talent 
i still worry that there are others ways of tracing this?? My brother is really good with computers and often alters the settings etc.
At least you have some relatively good times to remember at school, and being one of the 'cool' people, thats something to be proud of, ive never been there. i suppose that added to the pressure you felt though.
