Tillogram

@Till23 Hello friend. Just wanting to let you know that I hope a break helps and thwt you take very good care of yourself. You are very much loved here on the forums. Thinking of you.

Hi @rav3n thank you for responding. I hope you are well and I hope the holiday period is a good one for you. It’s a bit hard to know what to say because some people find Christmas a very challenging time.

Hi @Cuddlebear thank you so much for your post. I hope you and Wilbur are well and I hope the tapering journey is not too difficult currently. I think it might be a bit difficult for you over the holiday period with less things happening. I think I recall you have at least one child, I hope you can catch-up (if that’s a positive thing for you).

Thanks so much for posting because sometimes I wonder if my posts are in any way helpful for you, which is my intention. So it was nice to get your post

@Till23 I’m glad you are here. I want you to know you can be on the forums in whatever way you are feeling and that includes when you feel awful, anxious and have negative feelings you want to express. You are not taking away anything from anyone else by being here and being able to express exactly how you feel. You do not need to mask here at all and you are worthy of attention, support and the love we have for you.

Whether you have a particular reason or not re MH difficulties is of no consequence. You have MH challenges and this is your community and we don’t need any reasons whatsoever.

Feeling lonely is such a hard situation to live with. This time of year makes that even worse as we are told by media and social media how everyone is so happy and connected. The truth is that we have a big crisis in people being lonely. It’s OK to express how Xmas time is affecting you. This is a safe space to do that. I certainly understand and will not be celebrating. It really drags me down this time of year I can’t even tolerate seeing anything related to Xmas or new year. Does it make you feel even more isolated? I know it does for me. I’ve not been invited anywhere and will be home alone waiting for it all to be over with.

You are not lazy or ineptitude. I can MH is causing you to feel this way.

You do not need to be upbeat. I love you exactly as you are and I know others here do too.

You are precious and worthy of our time and emotional investment in your wellbeing.

You’ve been such a huge support to me. I can honestly say you’ve really helped me in surviving days that felt so dark and heavy. I’m going to do the same right back.

@Till23 I saved your thread as a favourite so I could communicate easier with you on your personal thread.

Wilbur is very well and just had his dinner. It’s been raining here all day so he’s stuck indoors in my small flat. That’s ok though he’s had toys and me to amuse me and enjoys his naps.

Im still feeling brutal symptoms. I’m a complete and utter mess. Doing this alone with only a GP (who doesn’t understand at all) is hard. I’m tired of how I feel day in day out.

All your posts have been extremely helpful. You understand and validate how hard this is unlike my GP who thinks I should be all fine and dandy and drop more of my medication. I said to him tapering more right now would be like jumping off a cliff and he replied you’ll feel better it’s you causing all these symptoms. Truth is it is not my fault. It’s the fault of the medical people for tapering too fast and causing serotonin toxicity. Now my nervous system is frozen and I’m disassociating with terrible psychological and physical consequences. All these symptoms started while tapering. You actually validate how hard tapering is and give me some hope I might get through this. I can’t thank you enough for taking the time to care.

hey @Till23 we definitely don't expect you or any member here to be 'positive' all the time, so please know that you never have to pretend.

i know some people have confused recovery-oriented posting as posting positively so i did want to ask, would it be helpful to chat a bit about what recovery-focused posting looks like?

i assure you that you're not 'taking up our time'. i appreciate connecting and chatting with you! i think you're equally deserving of support as any other person in this community. i'm sorry to hear that the holiday period has been hard. please do whatever you feel is best for your mental health and safety - whether it's limiting what threads/spaces you interact in, taking some breaks from the forums, etc., we completely understand. whatever you decide, you're not letting us down.

i really appreciate you taking time to share this and be vulnerable with us. we're here for you no matter what 💗

Thank you @Cuddlebear. Just to let you know I will actually only be on forums sporadically over the next couple of weeks. I will be going up to my Dad’s property.
There is poor reception and difficulty charging phone, hence poor access to forums.

Thank you for what you wrote, thank you for your very kind words.

It’s 41 degrees here, that was the max, but it’s barely gone down. A fire just started near me in a little area of bushland but it looks like it’s under control. It’s only a little bit of bush. The fireys got here pretty quick.
We desperately need rain here.

I really miss my dogs, my girl passed away in 2023, just before my second cancer diagnosis and my boy passed away in May of this year. My dogs were 16 and 17 yo. So it’s a big change for me to have no dogs.

I am glad Wilbur is doing well. Even though it’s probably difficult for you when you are so ill, I’m sure he gives you great comfort and (at least) little bits of joy.

Are you able to access a different GP? This new attitude to de-prescribing is not superly new. So another GP might be more across it. !

Thanks @rav3n for your response and also for offering to explain the recently instituted recovery-focused protocol.. I think I pretty much understand it..

Even before that became a protocol I tried to be too negative.. Because it is difficult to read a lot of somber things and so I understand that it is good for people to be able to read not only supportive posts, but some things that may be helpful in their own journeys.

Anyhow I will be at my father's property, so hard to charge phone and internet access not good

Hi @AlwaysMyself just dropping by quickly to say hello as I'll be in a place with poor internet reception shortly at my father's property for a few weeks.

I am sorry to read (briefly) that things have not been so good for you just lately, maybe after leaving work. However, I see that you are striving to do things and stay connected. You really try hard with those things.

Hope things improve for you very shortly and you keep up with your crafts and ? DnD

Hi @Till23 , it is lovely to hear from you. 🥰

I hope the preparation work goes smoothly without too much stress. I can imagine it would be quite emotion-provocing with all the memories and connections to your father. *big safe warm hug*

I hope you don't interpret my lack of tagging you as a negative thing. Because i knew you were wanting to pull back from the forums in case of adverse MH impacts i didn't want to tag you in case you felt obligated to read or respond. You will always be welcome to read and comment, and i'm happy to tag you if you WANT me to continue to -- but i WANT to prioritise what YOU NEED in regard to tags 😊🥰.

I think the painting (and making my own plasters to paint) will give me something productive to do, without having the stress of coming up with "creativity" which my paper-crafts i used to do have.

I too am hoping my DnD night frustration eases and i regain more patience and tolerance in the new year as i am more rested and less pressured. Fingers crossed. Got to keep telling myself there is hope for that.

I really related to also sometimes in the past feeling that i have "less reason" to be depressed and/or "less important" to focus resources on. If we were to look at it objectively, i have *even less* reason to than you! You have experienced a lot more trauma than I. I am a white-Aussie born to a middle-class-wealthy family who never struggled to have a home or food or medical appointments when needed. I had very limited exposure to my CSA (less than my cousins, for example, who saw the perpetrator more often) - i only have 2 distinct memories of occasions. I had stable friendships through highschool (although i did get bullied at primary school for 2-3 years). I've been "highly employable" and good academically, without learning difficulties.

...but you know what? Mental health doesn't discriminate like that. Despite my socioeconomic fortuitous upbringing, i still got depression at a young age and it never went into remission even with treatment. I have learned to have a high degree of self-control and perseverance through treatment, but that doesn't mean that I am not worth giving support to. I still need support to maintain and encourage me. And i have learnt to trust that here the PSW *will* triage on crisis-urgency, so i then feel that i *can* tag them without worrying that i am taking away from someone else in *more urgent* need. 😊. I trust them to do their job with regard to triage. And hey, if they don't for some reason (unlikely!) - thats not MY fault and doesnt mean that I have caused a problem. I know that a delayed response means they are busy (as i know you also reassure them its OK to take awhile to respond too) and will get to me when able.

I know it may not sink in emotionally, but if you feel you "dont have a reason to be depressed and thus dont deserve the support" - i encourage you to think on myself and how i have little *objective* reasons but like yourself have a lot of *subjective feeling* of depression, and think about whether you think it is valid for me to ask for support. 😉 (often we feel it is of course valid for others, but not for ourself - even if it were the same situation!! I hope this can be a way for you to challenge yourself in this. But its also OK if you end up just thinking we both should shut up and soldier on 🤣🤣 i'm totally accepting that that is how some people feel, like my sister).

Hope the time around your siblings goes faster than anticipated with more time-out than expected.

Sending you lots of self-care wishes.