Lifes on a thread

LegacyUser

Hi.

Its hard to do this without just holding down the backspace key at the end of every sentence. I don't even know how to do this.

I just maybe want to get something out and if anyone has advice or gone through this it might help.

I'll start with me, im in my late twenties and always been a bit weird anyway, I've been raised with a family that never shows any emotions does believe in depression or feelings. I don't really get on with them anyway. I guess this has a lasting impression though as its unusual to see people expressing feelings and for me to express them. For about 10 years now I've been depressed, on and off, convincing myself I can handle it or just doing what I know which is ignoring things repressing them or just brushing it off, be a man get a hold of yourself etc.

Through depression I met and the only best friend I've ever had. It made me feel normal I guess to see someone else felt the same and made me think everyone feels like this everyone goes through it, it'll be ok.

Then 5 years ago, he killed himself. ever since then things have been different. it took me months to believe it had happened, and I couldn't cry or show any emotion. I couldn't even go to the funeral. ever since then I've felt emotionally numb. I've never really felt angry/sad/happy and I cant cry. there's been times when I should have but I cant.

Over the past while a combination of things overwhelm me and it feels like im living on a thread, most of the time I do the ignore it be strong act but it feels like at any moment something could happen and tip me over the edge. like there's two sides..

One part of me has just got married to someone I couldn't love any more if I tried and has a great career. the other part of me wants to lie down and never get up.

When I feel like that I feel guilty,

Kipperhell

The general advice is go seek help. You could have issues about expressing yourself and accurately evaluating emotions. It sounds like depression but you just need emotional tools to navigate through life that many people naturally pick up. Sometimes family environment don't give enough support when you need it but living now you can still figure it out.

Personally I find GPs a bit quick on prescription but a councillor often helps people by giving feedback and a bit more direction in solving actual problems.

extra-ordinary_

Talk to your doctor and if you can't talk to him/her then change doctors. It sounds like you are very disconnected from your emotions and maybe it's possible that counselling will help. Contact your doctor.

miec

Hi Op

I am very sorry for the loss of your friend, losing someone to suicide is horrendous. I lost someone very close to me in the same circumstances and I was numb for a while and tried the being strong and hid my pain behind alcohol but eventually it caught up with me and I had to go for counselling.

I would urge you to go to counselling, preferably with a trained psychotherapist, I went to group therapy and it was a great setting because I grew in a family that didn't allow emotions, depression etc and I lived in a numb bubble for many years. The group therapy enabled me to get in touch with my emotions and express past and present hurts. You need to learn how to feel, that is why you feel depressed because you are not experiencing the full range of emotions. It is very scary at first but eventually when you get used to it your life will take on a richness and beauty and you'll give yourself permission to be weird, feel great, feel angry, to share and so on.

magneticimpulse

Hi OP
Im also sorry to hear about the loss of your friend. Nobody should feel that low in life that they would want to end life. As other posters have pointed out, your not alone and I too feel no emotions and have been through similar experience as yourself. However it is good to talk to a professional about it. They can help you discover yourself and discover the joys of life and being happy. Do you have a girlfriend? Take part in social groups or charity? I think helping other people and doing good things can help you discover how rewarding life is.

Shootenanny

Hi OP
Reading your post just makes my heart break...it seems like your working so so hard to keep yourself together...but you have been through the massive trama of loosing someone you love through suicide and maybe these feelings were so intense that you numbed yourself, which is a perfectly normal grief reaction...it sounds like you don't feel that you have the ability to express yourself (which makes sense if you come from a family where your feelings weren't acknowledged)..
You don't have to live like this..please speak to your GP or seek out a registered therapist - life doesn't have to be this hard, be kind to yourself.

Esroh

Please go get help. You are worth so much more to people around you than you will ever know.

LegacyUser

thanks for replies, i know i need to talk to someone, everytime i feel close to doing it the other part of me says pull yourself together i dont need help theres nothing wrong with me.

I feel incredibly guilty for feeling this way, my wife knows i "sometimes" feel "down" or am quiet. but i havent told her everything. not that im trying to hide it i just dont think its fair on her. i dont know how to say , its like , mr.x is depressed .. he meets girl of his dreams they get married , disney movie happy ending... but hes still depressed... thats not fair.. why cant she make it go away, why cant she make him happy.

i know thats how she'll feel.

Kell

onathread wrote: »

I feel incredibly guilty for feeling this way, my wife knows i "sometimes" feel "down" or am quiet. but i havent told her everything. not that im trying to hide it i just dont think its fair on her. i dont know how to say , its like , mr.x is depressed .. he meets girl of his dreams they get married , disney movie happy ending... but hes still depressed... thats not fair.. why cant she make it go away, why cant she make him happy.

i know thats how she'll feel.

Whoa hay hay there just a second. Its an awful thing you have just done there to presume your wifes emotions. It denies her the opportunity to surprise you and to provide you with the emotional shoulder you just might need.

I suspect your wife may have chosen you as her partner in part through your emotional vulnerability. Give her credit for her decision and her trust in you to be who she expected you to be- honest with her.

K-

LegacyUser

Hi OP,

Know the feeling well, repressed emotions, throat tense like your always on the verge of crying but you cant, totally self conscious of what you look like or will look like if you do cry, and that thought is just not worth thinking! Always told to be a solider and suck it up....


My advice for the immediate is to give yourself permission not to cry, say to yourself your putting the wheels in motion to do something about it, but for now i will not put anymore pressure on myself.

The Perspective is that to an outsider - of course you feel overwhelmed emotionally, you have gone through so much, and you must be waiting all your life to express emotions if you have not grown up in a family that express any.

As someone who has come through this, i have to say that the repressing of the emotions is harder than the release of them, you are like a pressure cooker at the start but once it is released you feel great. Well i did anyway, if a therapist is too much for you to handle now, get some books first to start getting used to the idea, there are so many out there now, even books on how to go and see a therapist! Its hard to give you a list of my favourites because i feel you gravitate toward your own guides, but Eckhart Tolle, Wayne Dyer, Louise L Hay are all great starts, oh and 'Feal the Fear and Do it Anyway' susan jeffers is great too.


Keep trying to change your beliefs about hoe your meant to be and try open up to the way you want to be, deep down we all have that power, trust yourself, go at your own pace and best of luck! XXX

magneticimpulse

onathread wrote: »

thanks for replies, i know i need to talk to someone, everytime i feel close to doing it the other part of me says pull yourself together i dont need help theres nothing wrong with me.

I feel incredibly guilty for feeling this way, my wife knows i "sometimes" feel "down" or am quiet. but i havent told her everything. not that im trying to hide it i just dont think its fair on her. i dont know how to say , its like , mr.x is depressed .. he meets girl of his dreams they get married , disney movie happy ending... but hes still depressed... thats not fair.. why cant she make it go away, why cant she make him happy.

i know thats how she'll feel.

You should not see it as "you need help". Going to talk to someone is like going to the gym, or getting exercise classes. Or for example if there is a problem in work and you want clarity about something, you ask someone. Or if you need clothes you go out and buy them. Talking to someone is just as easy. There shouldnt be a hang up about it.

Usually they are there to listen. They will help you get in a routine where you might find a struggle. They give advice, but they never do it in a forceful way. I see myself as having a "Boss/Supervisor" for work and then the councelling is like a "Supervisor" for my emotional/personal life. I was very nervous about going and felt like I was a failure in life for having to talk to someone.

But once I went, it was brillant. Instead of unloading problems onto other people, I could just go in and have a chat with this guy. The more I was open about councelling (my choice) other friends told me they too had gone for councelling. Week by week passed and initially I couldnt see the difference, but from start to finish I saw a huge improvement.

miec

i dont know how to say , its like , mr.x is depressed .. he meets girl of his dreams they get married , disney movie happy ending... but hes still depressed... thats not fair.. why cant she make it go away, why cant she make him happy.

Your wife will know something is wrong and you are denying her the opportunity to either listen or be there for you.

I suffer from depression and even though I know I have a good life now, when I am depressed I cannot access that feeling of life is good. Basically I now say to myself when I am down that I feel bad inside even though life is good. You can have the good things but still feel depressed, if you are reading the papers etc, Marian Keyes is suffering badly at the moment and she feels guitly because she has a loving husband, etc but is deeply depressed.

You do not need to feel guilty and the whole pull yourself together talk is just a patch up job. Let the depression be, tell your wife you are feeling low, take it easy on yourself and know this if you could get rid of the depression by pulling yourself together or just smiling or whatever useless platitudes that ignorant people say, know that if you could, you bloody well would.