Every time I turn around

Hi @Saree ,

Welcome to the Forums. My name is FloatingFeather and I am one of the peer support workers at SANE. Thank you for sharing your experience with us - I know for some people that posting initially can take courage or may feel uncomfortable. Please know that you are in a safe and anonymous space with a lot of supportive members from a wide range of lived experiences.

I can read your frustration in your post and from what you say your feelings make a lot of sense. It sounds like you feel like you're damned if you do and damned if you don't.

It does sound like you are doing everything in your power to move forward and you are doing so well yourself but you seemed to be constantly getting hurdles placed in your way. Is that how you are feeling?

I will include some of amazing community guides at the bottom of this post as a way of introducing you to some of our other members.

On an aside, if you want to directly chat with someone on the Forums use the @ symbol and then start typing their name directly after it. A dropdown box should appear, and you then select their name. This ensures that they are notified of any posts you mention them in.

Please keep posting and rant as much as you want 🙂. We are happy to have you onboard and want to help support you as much as we can.

I look forward to reading other responses to your post.

Warm wishes,

FloatingFeather

@Anastasia @AussieRecharger @BPDSurvivor @Faith-and-Hope @HenryX @jem80 @Judi9877 @NatureLover @outlander @Shaz51 @ShiningStar @Snowie @Hams @wellwellwellnez @Zoe7 @Aniela @Boo13 @CrazyChick @maddison @pinklollipop15 @Eve7

@Saree

I read your message and felt so angry for you. I completely understand how you feel. I am also so sick of incompetent and useless health professionals who act this way.
these so called “health professionals” need to get educated and start understanding that mental health is a big issue and goes beyond mild anxiety and depression. These so called “professionals” only want the “easy cases”. They only want easy clients who have been through a break up or are having relationships issues. Or they want mild cases of people with manageable anxiety or depression that’s not to out of control. I know these are serious issues and I’m not minimising them. But us more complex cases get thrown into the to hard basket. It’s disgusting. The whole point in working in Mental health is to help people. Not to only help healthy people who have mild issues that are solved in 10 sessions with some CBT and mindfulness. It’s a joke and they are a joke.

These “professionals” are clueless and have no idea what they are doing. I’m so glad that peer support workers are starting to be recognised for their importance. I’d choose a peer worker any day over a doctor or most so called psychologists.

It’s not you that is the problem. It’s the greedy, lazy and unskilled health workers who have a pathetic level of knowledge around mental health. They say you are to hard but what they are really saying is that they are not skilled.

I 100% stand with you and feel your frustration, sadness and anger over this.

Hey @Saree, welcome to the forums. I'm so sorry this has been your experience. I think it's a real strength that despite the barriers you've faced, you have kept reaching out. ❤️

Can I ask how you've been finding these folks so far? Or other ways you've sought support?

I can share some of my own experiences in response to your question. And I'm not super sure who or where you're reaching out to, but I also had a lot of frustrations when I started looking for support. The first time I saw a counsellor was at my university. It was free and TERRIBLE. I felt so dismissed and misunderstood. The second time, I tried accessing one through my work. Again, they were awful. I had a real problem I wanted help solving and mindfulness was suggested.

Please don't let this discourage you. I know a lot of people find the therapists to be so useful. For me, it's been life-changing.

After a lot of tries, I found someone who I've been working with for years. Every now and then I will still try a few other therapists to deal with some specific issues, and they aren't always great experiences.

What I reckon, is that it can take a long time to find the right people for support. For me, I often

• Ask for recommendations from trusted people in my life
• Use directories like the psychology today one to check people out. They often have bios and you sometimes you can have an intro call (you might have tried this already)
• Sometimes I also look up practitioners who do specific kinds of therapy. For example, I've found EMDR really beneficial for my trauma

Again, I'm sorry for these yuck experiences ❤️

Thanks everyone,

I have used Psychology Today, plus numerous other sites. But no avail.

Guess just at the point I'm over it and over trying to figure out ways forward.

Gets to a point that it seems easier to just give up.

I guess the point for posting was to give something else a go. Nothing has really worked, or there is nothing to try.

Sorry all

hmm @Saree that makes a lot of sense.

I'm wondering if you've tried some support groups or peer work as an alternative?

At SANE, we're about to re-open out drop-in peer work line where you can talk to trained peer workers who have had their own experiences of MH challenges. Or you could have a good search too! It's pretty awesome and peer work has been crucial to my own recovery ❤️

PS if you type "@" before the username, that user will get a notification that you've tagged them. Otherwise they might not see your message!

@Former-Member think I got it this time lol

No I haven't tried it.

When will it be up and running? Happy to give anything a go atm. Starting to feel suicidal again and just over everything.

Restarted certain meds to try and help, but bipolar cycle seems to be a bit out of sync atm.

Good Afternoon @Saree ,

The Peer Support lines are not yet open this week. Have you tried our drop-in counselling service? 1800 187 263 (M-F 10am-10pm AEST). There could be a bit of a wait this this line though.

Otherwise, I'm here on the forums for the next few hours if you need a chat through the forums.

@tyme thanks, but don't want to be a burden.

I honestly don't even know what to talk about anyways.

Just more a sliding cliff that shouldve passed and has returned. As is the nature of Bipolar I guess.

Then trauma shit just won't leave me alone.

😞 sorry

You're not a burden at all @Saree - that's what I'm here for!

So what's happening for you today?