mental illness

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**** Wow, I could see myself in your post quite a few years ago. At the
time I was a 34 year old mother of 3 young children, one of whom was only 2 years old. I
felt I had nothing to live for, so one Sunday morning, while my husband and children were at
Mass, I took sleeping pills with a bottle of scotch. I was passed out and ready for death when
my family came home and found me. I was rushed to the ER of a local hospital and then I
was transferred to a PSYCH WING, where I stayed for 3 months. During that time I came to
understand the horror of clinical depression and what it can do to someone every day. My
Psychiatrist at the time asked me “Why do you want to die?” and I told him “Because I have
nothing to live for.” He made me understand that Jesus wanted me to be happy, that HE wants
HIS children to be happy. My Doctor was Catholic and I did not realize at the time, how much
that would mean.
After 3 months, I went home and tried to regain what little was left of a bad marriage. It did
not work. After a bitter divorce and an annulment, I carried on with my life.
Every day I fight the Clinical Depression and Bipolar disorder. It is NOT easy. Jesus never
told us our life would be easy. HE did tell us HE would always be there to help us. SO, let
HIM help you. DO NOT GIVE UP. Keep fighting for your life. YOU CAN DO IT IF YOU TRY.
Remember that Jesus loves you and so do I.
Alex ( I am a 72 year old mother of 5)🙂
 
Alex_Swol said:
**** Wow, I could see myself in your post quite a few years ago. At the
time I was a 34 year old mother of 3 young children, one of whom was only 2 years old. I
felt I had nothing to live for, so one Sunday morning, while my husband and children were at
Mass, I took sleeping pills with a bottle of scotch. I was passed out and ready for death when
my family came home and found me. I was rushed to the ER of a local hospital and then I
was transferred to a PSYCH WING, where I stayed for 3 months. During that time I came to
understand the horror of clinical depression and what it can do to someone every day. My
Psychiatrist at the time asked me “Why do you want to die?” and I told him “Because I have
nothing to live for.” He made me understand that Jesus wanted me to be happy, that HE wants
HIS children to be happy. My Doctor was Catholic and I did not realize at the time, how much
that would mean.
After 3 months, I went home and tried to regain what little was left of a bad marriage. It did
not work. After a bitter divorce and an annulment, I carried on with my life.
Every day I fight the Clinical Depression and Bipolar disorder. It is NOT easy. Jesus never
told us our life would be easy. HE did tell us HE would always be there to help us. SO, let
HIM help you. DO NOT GIVE UP. Keep fighting for your life. YOU CAN DO IT IF YOU TRY.
Remember that Jesus loves you and so do I.
Alex ( I am a 72 year old mother of 5)🙂
Click to expand...
You are right. Jesus is here to go through the ups and downs with us.

I suffered from over 12 years of severe bipolar disorder, with a few really bad depressions including where I wanted to die (but I wasn’t going to do it myself) but much more mania. There is healing through the Holy Spirit. Medicine can manage the symptoms but the healing involves feeding all aspects of yourself not just physical and mental, but spiritual and social and emotional. There is hope, and love can heal. Contemplative prayer was a great asset to me, and the writings of saints like St. John of the Cross and St. Teresa of Avila.

MS
 
Sorry to hear about that. I also suffer from mental issues. Sometimes the anxiety gets so bad that I feel as if I’m about to die. Every day is a new beginning, though. Your past doesn’t define what your future will be like. Concentrate on getting through each day, my friend. Don’t concern yourself with how you’ll cope a year from now, ten years from now or anything like that.

I know you don’t see much hope for yourself. Instead of filling your mind with thoughts of what you can’t do, think about what you can do. You have special gifts and talents that are unique to you, so it would be a shame to lose you. I hope you’ll reconsider harming yourself.
 
Irish_Cabbie said:
Shut up, you drama queen. Someone wrote that they were suicidal. That person needs to see a doctor immediately. You are an idiot to suggest otherwise.
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To Irish,
I have been called worse. Have a nice evening.:):rolleyes:
 
Irish_Cabbie said:
Shut up, you drama queen. Someone wrote that they were suicidal. That person needs to see a doctor immediately. You are an idiot to suggest otherwise.
Click to expand...
Go look in the mirror before you start pointing fingers and calling people names.
 
Irish_Cabbie said:
The comments of mine that you quoted weren’t directed to you, Alex Swol.
Click to expand...
No, they were directed at me, and I, too, have been called worse, Irish Cabbie. 👍

To save you time telling Christy Beth not to speak for me, she already has as well. :cool:

MS
 
Alex_Swol said:
I could see myself in your post. That was
many years ago. I was a young mother of 3 in a very unhappy marriage. One Sunday
morning, I took a bottle of sleeping pills and swallowed half a bottle of scotch and passed out.
My family found me and I went to the ER of a local hospital where I was then transferred to the
Psych ward. I spent 3 months in rehab. My psychiatrist at the time asked me why I wanted to
die and I told him because I had nothing to live for. He told me that Jesus wants HIS children
to be happy and he would help me get that way. It has not been easy because I have clinical
depression and I fight it every day. YOU need to FIGHT every day too. Death is NOT the
answer. It is the coward’s way to commit suicide. I have learned many things in the 40 years
since my attempt to end my life. Our life is a gift. What we do with that gift is ours alone. We
can do good or we can waste it. Wallowing in self-pity never did anyone any good. Look
around you. There MUST be something or someone you want to live for. Stop it!!! Go and
enjoy your life. Thank your Heavenly Father for what HE has given you and get on with your
life.
Remember you are loved,
Alex ( I am a 72 year old mother of 5)
Click to expand...
Thank you for your encouragement Alex, I feel deeply glad yet envious of you that you found the strength to live.
I have fought it for what i think for about as long as I can remember, and in the recent 6 months that’s all I can think of from waking up to going to bed. I feel like it’s constantly in my head and the notion that I need to “fight” it actually strengthen the need for me to think about them.

I have scheduled an appointment with my family doctor, I will keep all of you good people posted on updates.
 
God has given you life and now you are saying you don’t want it? Maybe one thing is bringing you down. It will pass. Whatever it is, you have to make it a non-issue. Just pick yourself up and move on. There is a lot of happiness in the days to come. Just look for it or even better, make it. Depression is a day by day battle, but guess what, you have the ability to fight against it. Do it for a better quality of life. And for your spiritual life, make a good confession and do not miss Mass. I am with you on this. Praying for you.
 
hihiip201 said:
Thank you for your encouragement Alex, I feel deeply glad yet envious of you that you found the strength to live.
I have fought it for what i think for about as long as I can remember, and in the recent 6 months that’s all I can think of from waking up to going to bed. I feel like it’s constantly in my head and the notion that I need to “fight” it actually strengthen the need for me to think about them.

I have scheduled an appointment with my family doctor, I will keep all of you good people posted on updates.
Click to expand...
You sound to me like you have a good handle on the situation. I am glad to hear you are taking steps to address it. 👍

May I recommend a good book by a neuroscientist? It’s about how to “take in the good” which is his method of finding good thoughts and allowing them to change your thinking the same way scary thoughts naturally do. :cool:

I have the Kindle and audio versions, and have been listening in the car. 🙂

They have a “look inside” preview at amazon.com:

Hardwiring Happiness: The New Brain Science of Contentment, Calm, and Confidence

MS
 
To Mystical Seeker----It is encouraging to read a post that tells it like it should be told. Now
I know there are others here who have courage to put people in their place.
 
Alex_Swol said:
To Mystical Seeker----It is encouraging to read a post that tells it like it should be told. Now
I know there are others here who have courage to put people in their place.
Click to expand...
Thank you. As others did for me when I was down, I’m pleased to do for others. 👍

Speaking truth, even when against “common thinking” has become a sort of life goal for me. After 12 years of hell, with the major cause is how confused I was about fools and hypocrites everywhere – in business, civic life, and yes in our own parish leadership committees – and my inability to function when they did things that made no sense and were seemingly arbitrary, my skin has gotten either tougher or more transparent I can’t quite figure out which. 😛

I used to let people like that tell me what to say and what not to, what to do and what not to, and I tried to even learn to think like them and I couldn’t do it and I “blew a gasket” as it were. So now I know that without certain psychological “indifference” toward their influence, an honest mind and heart can truly be in trouble in this world. Parts of the time they were locking me up without even telling me why, I really did feel like I was being persecuted for being a follower of Jesus. :knight1:

The idea of some shallow entity over the Internet that thinks it’s going to get under my skin after all my mind has been through, is actually comical if it didn’t speak for the sadness of the human condition that generates all too many people who are thus shallow and think the whole world is governed by a few simplistic attitudes and witty cliches, and who make others out to be stupid if they don’t agree. :takethat:

The defensive mind cannot learn, because that’s what defensiveness is biologically designed to do. Protecting old “knowledge” from becoming corrupted with new ideas. Like the wine skin story Jesus told. Being defensive and judgmental and anxious is like having “Old Wine Skins.”

That human condition and my inability to understand it “with any form of logic I could imagine,” stripped me temporarily of my senses, my previously lucrative career. My previous pastor was a jerk and he dealt with my problems by banning me from parish property outside of dropping kids off or going to Mass. (Luckily his replacement is nurturing and he helped me get better and undo the damage the previous one had done.)

And after all that I’m going to let some person tell me I must agree with a plan to stop everything and immediately go to an ER for an non-emergency situation that if it had truly been an emergency would have been at least 12 hours too late? And that I’m an idiot or “drama queen” to think otherwise? And since I don’t realize how wrong I am that I’ll change my mind because of a few names he called me? It’s simplistic thinking and acting on the part of people like that, who exacerbated and prolonged my illness, not to mention playing quite a role its onset in the first place. :rolleyes:

I have to say my favorite part was the bit about “drama queen.” Like a drama queen isn’t the one calling to get in the troops when all a person is looking for is a little reframing. Don’t make me laugh. As you said, we’ve both been called worse. :rotfl:

Sorry, Homey don’t play that game no more. 😃

MS
 
Mystic—
I am not sure I would have taken the time to explain my reasons for my post as well as you
did. As with everything in life, there are those who need more attention than others and I
am sure the MEMBER who GETS TO YOU is one of those. I have learned that life is too
precious to let such trivial things bother me and DRAMA QUEEN is one of the nicer names
I have been called.
Alex
 
Alex_Swol said:
Mystic—
I am not sure I would have taken the time to explain my reasons for my post as well as you
did. As with everything in life, there are those who need more attention than others and I
am sure the MEMBER who GETS TO YOU is one of those. I have learned that life is too
precious to let such trivial things bother me and DRAMA QUEEN is one of the nicer names
I have been called.
Alex
Click to expand...
Alex, that’s awesome advice. And yes I did take it personally. 😛

Most of the time they don’t get to me like that. :rolleyes:

MS
 
Mystical ,
Thank you for writing that I gave you awesome advice. Years of trying to always find the
good in others has taught me that some people have NO GOOD in them and why bother.
Web sites attract all kinds of people and we are blind as to WHO may be reading our posts.
I have had problems at other sites and hesitated to join this one. There are those who use sites to gain information and also to gain attention. LET IT GO. Keep it simple by just ignoring
him / her. The more attention you give someone who is a PAIN, the more they will vye for your
attention. Who needs it? Let it go, say a prayer for that person and get on with life. Use this
little bit of advice also: ASAP means always say a prayer.
 
Follow-up is occurring offline.

Thanks to those who offered help and prayer.

Individuals in danger of harm, whether from others or from themselves, should immediately seek professional help, either from the police or professional counseling services respectively.

It is a forum policy not to allow discussions aimed at a particular individual in such circumstances because this is not an appropriate venue for resolving such problems.

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