I have seen it written there's only two types of people in the world @Ru-bee
the diagnosed and the undiagnosed, my first diagnosis requiring medication started age 49.
the question what role has connection played in my mental health journey.
it's been an adjustment I'm still getting my head around as connection to me was s threat growing up
Being liked and known by many while connecting with few worked until entering rooms of psychologists and psychiatrists.
i learnt i had to trust strangers or they couldnt help me and i needed help.
a life of associating trust with connection made me feel distressed in therapy first up.
turned out i was lucky my first psychologist was trauma informed and so i learned what safe connection felt like in therapy.
That has proven to be monumental in my journey for i have had clinicians that i didn't have an issue saying not feeling it then moving on.
had they been my first experience i would have thrown walls up and not have any of the coping tools or education i have since learnt i definitely would have been cagey towards any other therapist.
i did struggle when i had to change to new psychologist pretty hard, it was out of our control and although part of therapy for ne it felt like losing a valuable friend from connecting only with long term friends before as the connection that was ending i had complete trust instead of my thinking ii done something wrong i listened to them and accepted it wasn't personal and i wasn't being punished.
The very few people i believed i connected with in my personal, family and work life were all broken within first year of diagnosis and that's when i found SANE forums after a podcast mentioned it.
so grateful i actually did before i forgot
The people i met in the forums although anonymous became very real.
i looked forward to getting back on forum each day to see how they were and the non-judgement, understanding and encouragement was so new to me i felt part of it though.
knowing the trouble text gets ne in i feared being shunned and like @@ENKELI posted if i didn't get tagged id see rejection and if moderators changed something id feel id ruined a good thing and be unable to open emails or return to forum till i learned its common thought to new users but not the case.
i still tried to never leave someone out which soon became difficult no matter the effort .and then if tag support ratio was massively out worried i was annoying and overt tagging.
the connection id seen as a threat my whole life i now thought i was a threat to it & no one had once given me reason too it was my fear of being misunderstood and thinking if family & friends decided was easier turn away than deal with me of course people are going to can me on a computer.
it's a different beast for ne I'm not on Facebook or any of them things so not used to conversation be exposed to anyone.
id post in the safety felt with a particular forumite or five who id shared a bit with already then, my mind would worry if i said too much and i could even see the parts of a post i shared with someone was going to paint me as a villain to another that didn't know its context.
happened recently after i couldn't connect to a group about connection, yes that's right.
self-compassion was blown straight out the water and in case i wasn't doing a good enough job telling myself where i let good people down i thought for them as well and was convinced id spoken out of school and offended people shown disrespect all of it i didn't even open laptop for 2 days then on the third day doubled down on how rude i had been by not responding or connecting on forum so all the stuff id created thinking id done i now had done idiot i said, told myself they won't even know I'm gone the connection was in my head from wanting to belong they were just being polite glad I'm gone while quietly missing the people i had shared space with each day for months.
day 4 i couldn't sleep had a look at forums very early thinking i won't be noticed, so avoid any responding when upset at the negative responses i had created.
had a massive number under my bell thing and i saw a couple recent i went to thread and saw i was stupid and causing my own harm to the connections i had from disappearing and people were worried. got two posts in then overwhelmed even just being just being on the forum again and not knowing how to respond to that many tags fairly without missing something coz as soon as i respond to first unattended mention the whole lot mark as read.
it was five pages deep so by time i got to the top of list id already be pages behind again looking like i was ignoring when trying to catch up and what if i comment on something 4 days old and cause distress for someone that had forgotten about four day old stuff instant overload just rolled over and went sleep woke up see what was said and thought maybe i can just start from here and saw the support and encouragement for people i want to acknowledge but reality is i cant if i dont know what they are dealing with a lot can change in an hr i been gone four days and that leads to
Q2 is there anything I'm working to connect with currently....
I'm working to reconnect with forebites i showed disrespect by first thinking for them despite them only being kind and not showing up even just to see whets true instead of ruminating on my catastrophic thinking and showing i was ok.
I'm working on connecting to Faith as closely as i should be and have been.
I'm working on connecting with abstinence again by end of year
connecting with myself and my strengths alongside working on my mental health
connecting to work again without fear of involuntarily trauma responses or at least knowing i can regulate calm when it happenss in any surroundings.
i do know people are free to have an opinion and comment accordingly.
Don't seek validation or need everyone to like me and if i made it unclear above i really aren't troubled by my truth being disagreed with as i know i have a different lens from living a different life i also know if i say something its from being through it i dont make anything up so why argue what i know.
my fear was for the connection to the forum thinking to upset or offend one user loses connection to all. again, making what i was afraid of real with no reason too.
oh yeah the moderator emails, if you get one be sure to read the bottom line it really changed my perception and helped me understand how necessary they are and appreciate them.
