Awareness of Women's Mental Health

@Owlunar My experience with my dad being so volatile and never knowing when he would explode into rage or crumble with his mental health. That created a big sense of fear and hopelessness. And loneliness, because of course you think you are the only one experiencing a childhood like this. It leaves you very vulnerable and exposed. It was not a good childhood.

Hi @Appleblossom

We certainly do not want women feeling alienated and weird and there is certainly a dichotomy in every debate - hence the whole idea - being differences into the open and hoping someone in a multicultural society women can feel whole and welcome whatever their differences

Viva la difference - it certainly does make the world an interesting place

As I am writing all I am battling with here I can see I started from a better place although I wonder at my parents and their choices a lot - and this could be true of the best children from the best circumstances - after all - we have to blame our fallen arches and astigmatism on someone so let's blame our genes - but it does seem as if women have life harder in many respects. That glass ceiling is real - I have bashed my head upon it so much I think I do it because it feels so good when I stop

But then - if my mother could be asked she would say I am argumentative and I think that's a good thing

I read what you wrote - good - that wasn't easy but I thought about it last night actually and I think we all need to have a point of truth to start from but where do we find that point of truth and how do we know it's truth - after all "What is truth?"

I have thought about that for years - I can't say if I know now but I might - but then - what's true for me might not be truth for someone else

But when I hear men putting women down I do wonder what women have done to deserve that - the truth I believe is that they haven't. Men need women as much as women need men and basically we need the difference or the race would die with the individuals

So - we do need to respect each other and love the differences. I feel that men have more to prove than women which is one reason women feel so difference and in some cultures that has become so entrenched it will take the girls from those families their lifetimes to be free of it - and I wish this were not the case

Things are often lost in translation - we interpret things differently - but let's say it - let;s battle with it - it gives us a safety valve for our frustration even as we try and over-come, change or accept - whichever works for us

Go for it Apple

Dec

Hi @utopia

Life with a volatile father would be distressing and not give you a sound life-script - this comes across in your writing though I only learned about your father fairly recently

And you are not the only one - my mother was a scary person and I never knew when she would blow her lid - when we were little kids my bro and I were scared of her - it changed to being passive-aggressive when we got older

What happened to your father? You only need answer that if you feel okay about it -

btw - I don't actually know if I have mentioned it but when I was only a child to a teen we lived on two different police stations in a semi-rural area - I heard a lot and I saw a lot - one reason I wonder about our parents' decisions - now in my later years I don't think it was a wise decision even though it seemed exciting at the time

Dec

Hi @Maggie

Thanks - yes - I had woman-flu - and I live here with the cat so I had to fend for myself

Man-flu is so much worse - I would be lying on the couch with all the bedding like the guy with Free-View Plus and his remote control needing more tea - awwwww

Actually - I did feel pretty crappy but I figured it's a bloody long-weekend and I felt okay about staying in bed with the sink getting crowded with more and more coffee cups and soup bowls and I ate lots of snacks and felt okay about that too - and made myself some vegetable soup - and let the cat get away with holding me down with her paws - like she could

I am feeling okay today - I have to go out and I was doing so well with my walks and did 3 half-hours in a week but today - thinking about it - I don't think I will walk today

Not after the woman-flu anyway

Dec

@Owlunar Lol

My dad died in late 2000.

@utopia I hear you about your difficulties with your father.

I had a few friends who had obviously alcoholic dads and saw a bit. I felt lucky in some ways that I did not have to worry about managing violent outbursts ... not easy with ,,,, not easy without .... someone on this site was talking about the devil and the deep blue sea ,,,,

Thanks @Owlunar

Just enjoyed a biopic about Hannah Arendt and a Disney post from @Former-Member about Siamese cats.

Keep the discussion going Ladies.

Hi @utopia

My father died in 2011 and he was just short of his 91st birthday and I bought a card and a stamp for his birthday but he didn't make it

And your father has been gone for getting on for 20 years - how do you find the time passing - I found the first few weeks lasting forever but after that time has gone really fast.

Hi @Appleblossom

I want to keep this thread running even if it becomes the thread I keep writing on - I have thought about the magazine with all the good ideas and they are good but as a uni grad I know to be careful of plagiarism - totally unaware of where my ideas start and finish but I have decided to write about Life Scripts and how they affect us and they do - and we all have a bunch of them - how they run is that we are given information which is sometimes toxic and for some reason the toxic comments feed our life-scripts more than the growth-stimulating comments - and I wonder if anyone ever beats this

I was confounded in Year 2 - until then school had been boring because I thought I was sent there to learn something but I wasn't learning anything all that interesting until I was taught new tables and I went home and told my mother I had learned something at school and she snapped "About time!!" and to this day I wonder about that because I had been sitting there like a baby bird waiting for something interesting to happen but it seemed to me my mother thought it was my fault

humph 0_l_]

So I think from this example - I think my mother might have been pregnant but that didn't help - I thought I was defective in some way for not learning much at school and that wrote a part of my life-script and what part of my brain caused me to spend the rest of my life finding stuff to learn because to me what might have been a God-given gift was stimulated by a discontented woman who was devoted to tearing me down whenever she could.

From this kind of comment peoplec can believe they are also bad, inferior and unwanted

This can lead to beliefs of failure, incomplete and of course stupid

There are many life-scripts and they are so often negative and lead to destruction of any present self-esteem - and it can come from either or both parents, other relatives, school teachers and significant others in society and I get back to Dr Phil

Why is it so hard for some people to give us due praise and then - what is it that makes it hard for us to believe praise and accept compliments?

I want to know - I read so much of it - so much is on TV -

Where did it come from and what can we do - @Former-Member has a good idea - I think it's BabyDragon - she wants to know how to avoid handing this onto her son and I think @utopia has asked the same thing

I do remember telling myself that it all stopped in my generation and I think it my branch of the family with its few little twigs has escaped but not my sister and her daughter alas - we can only help ourselves in the long run

I wish everyone a good night's sleep and hope all have an okayish day tomorrow

Dec

@Owlunar. An interesting point - being given praise.

My mum is pro actively praising me many times each week -re: how well I'm doing with my mental health at the moment. I think my suicide attempt scared her and she could finally see what grip Depression had on me. So seeing me Depression free, has shown her how much energy it takes to fight to keep well (still secretly scared I will crash again).

It's nice to receive the praise.

Hi @utopia

It's really great to hear that you believe it's nice to receive praise and to be able to accept it - you have worked really hard and taken a terrible chance to get past a really bad place

And I think it's pretty normal to feel you may slip back - in fact - I think it's a good idea to have that in your back pocket - so to speak - it's like being prepared - making sure it doesn't catch you unawares

It's like quitting smoking in a way - I know I quit so often I wondered if I would ever make it - but when the time was right I did quit -

And I am pretty sure you have tried to quit - but here's the thing - every time you try and quit - even if you fail - it's one step closer - and with your depression you have made it out of your shadows for now and hopefully for good

Maybe having all of us here understanding and your Mum on board too - this is a huge step - maybe you have made it

Let's hope so anyway

And I am up to praise you - I think it's great - and I know you have other issues as well to overcome

But along with everyone else here I only know you through your writing but I read something that is being written by a woman who has been in the dark side of the world and learned a lot - that you have insight into your condition - something happened in your past that really tore you down and work cover made it harder for you - like you could pull your socks up because they wanted you to

No one would need to be told if it was possible - so often people have it wrong

I wish my Mum had been able to be proud of me now and again - it would have been so great but here's my idea - I saw my mother not long before she died - before she had the stroke - and she wept and I wiped her eyes and stroked her hands and I could see a woman with regrets

I am really so glad your mother is there for you - you deserve that much - I would like to know your Mum - okay - I would like to know you - but we all need the privacy to write so openly about ourselves

Dec