The addiction/depression thread.

[WorldofWarcraft]

Depression from grief is the worst and has no cure

 

[SinisterOne]

I am currently only addicted to smoking, even though it is not a hard drug with possible overdosing/insta fuck up effects it is still ruining me especially since I am occupying myself too much with sports, I always lack the required oxygen in my body and unable to keep up with conditioning. I know I need to quit it asap just waiting for a better timing to do so.

 

[vanguard86]

No matter what happens, never commit suicide. Seek help.

Prayers and medication helps, I suffered from OCD.

Intrusive thoughts and repeated actions are horrible.

But everything can be cured.

 

[Jim Bob]

I put my burdens to Jesus in prayer.

 

[45ACP]

Haven't posted here in a while. Thought some support would be nice and there are some members here who have really helped me out in the past. I don't even know who's around these days but this seems like an appropriate thread to post in for my 'return' to mayberry.

I've fallen back into drinking until I black out every night again since the collapse of the best relationship I ever had with the most amazing woman I've ever met. We're still so in love with each other and had both been fighting so hard to make it work and wanted it so badly but we just couldn't seem to figure it out. She's a recovering addict herself with some severe mental health issues and I had fallen madly in love with both her and the idea of spending the rest of my life taking care of her since she wasn't able to support herself. I felt like I had found purpose through that for the first time in my life.

I know this was a mistake to let happen but I invested so much in the relationship and this vision of a future with her and now with her gone I find myself feeling like there's no point to going to work, trying to make a living, owning a house and all the other responsibilities that come with a normal life if I'm not doing it for her. Living life only for myself just feels pointless and selfish now. I've been through difficult breakups before and it's always been a hard thing for me to deal with but in the past I always used them to motivate me to self-improvement and every time I came out better afterwards. But I'm falling apart this time and I think it's related to this feeling of finally experiencing real purpose and meaning in my life and then losing it.

I had been trying to sell my house and move before I met her because I just really felt I didn't belong where I'm at and knew there were other places in the country that are more conducive to the kind of life I wanted to live. Plus I was tired of taking care of a big house all by myself and really didn't feel like there were any good reasons for me to stay and a lot of reasons to leave. Everything changed when I met her. I decided what I truly wanted was to invite her to live with me in my house and spend the rest of my life with her. Now that that dream is gone I want to move again but my house isn't worth what it was when I bought it and I'd have to come up with some cash of my own to pay off my mortgage (which I don't really have). I'm almost at the point where I'm ready to say fuck it and just pack my shit and walk away.

I can see the depression coming. It's something that runs in my family that I've struggled with most of my life. I'm becoming more and more withdrawn, unmotivated, antisocial, etc. I've been here before and I know all the things I should be doing to prevent it from getting any worse but I'm not motivated to do any of them. I smoke a bunch of weed every morning to ease the hangover, drag myself into work where I go outside and chain smoke every hour, can't focus on anything and have to put on a smile and pretend everything's fine. Then sometimes I'll drag myself to the gym for an hour after work then go home and either go out to the bar by myself or just drink at home. Then I wake up and go through the motions all over again. I can't find enjoyment in anything any more.

Thanks to anyone who actually read all that shit.

 

[45ACP]

Depression from grief is the worst and has no cure

this

 

[OneManOrgy]

I dont get why people are addicted to coke and drugs like that. I have tried coke twice and never got addicted to it. Dont be offended by this but are people who use Coke, Meth and these other drugs that weak? I am certain it is to some chemical unbalance but a strong individual would be able to kick the habit if they'd used it.

What strength was it? Cocaine is a fucked drug, the amount of times it gets cut. Whoever you get it from cuts it, then other little dealers cut it and by time you get it it's shit. Quality cocaine can be quite the devil's habit.

 

[Scott Parker 27]

don't get rich if you are an addict, of any kind.
imagine what will happen if you will suddenly be able to afford all the things that make you sick.
now, imagine you are rich enough so that money is not an issue, so that you can afford to sponsor the addictions of your friends as well.
you will become a walking black hole of destruction.

Ya you cant have both. Thats why I never cared about money, rather feel good. You cant take money with you when u die so fuck it.

 

[Swoliosis]

I've recently found myself drinking more to cope with stress and been blacking out again while drinking lately. I don't seem to know when to stop and had a good hold of it until recently.

Recently got engaged, purchased a home and work has been getting a little more hectic in my department and find that any time I have to myself I'll simply just drink and get hammered.

It's only a couple days a week but I still tend to binge drink even when I'm by myself. Hopefully once I get my small gym set up furnished at my new place I'll have an outlet to keep me busy.

 

[Zer]

Haven't posted here in a while. Thought some support would be nice and there are some members here who have really helped me out in the past. I don't even know who's around these days but this seems like an appropriate thread to post in for my 'return' to mayberry.

I've fallen back into drinking until I black out every night again since the collapse of the best relationship I ever had with the most amazing woman I've ever met. We're still so in love with each other and had both been fighting so hard to make it work and wanted it so badly but we just couldn't seem to figure it out. She's a recovering addict herself with some severe mental health issues and I had fallen madly in love with both her and the idea of spending the rest of my life taking care of her since she wasn't able to support herself. I felt like I had found purpose through that for the first time in my life.

I know this was a mistake to let happen but I invested so much in the relationship and this vision of a future with her and now with her gone I find myself feeling like there's no point to going to work, trying to make a living, owning a house and all the other responsibilities that come with a normal life if I'm not doing it for her. Living life only for myself just feels pointless and selfish now. I've been through difficult breakups before and it's always been a hard thing for me to deal with but in the past I always used them to motivate me to self-improvement and every time I came out better afterwards. But I'm falling apart this time and I think it's related to this feeling of finally experiencing real purpose and meaning in my life and then losing it.

I had been trying to sell my house and move before I met her because I just really felt I didn't belong where I'm at and knew there were other places in the country that are more conducive to the kind of life I wanted to live. Plus I was tired of taking care of a big house all by myself and really didn't feel like there were any good reasons for me to stay and a lot of reasons to leave. Everything changed when I met her. I decided what I truly wanted was to invite her to live with me in my house and spend the rest of my life with her. Now that that dream is gone I want to move again but my house isn't worth what it was when I bought it and I'd have to come up with some cash of my own to pay off my mortgage (which I don't really have). I'm almost at the point where I'm ready to say fuck it and just pack my shit and walk away.

I can see the depression coming. It's something that runs in my family that I've struggled with most of my life. I'm becoming more and more withdrawn, unmotivated, antisocial, etc. I've been here before and I know all the things I should be doing to prevent it from getting any worse but I'm not motivated to do any of them. I smoke a bunch of weed every morning to ease the hangover, drag myself into work where I go outside and chain smoke every hour, can't focus on anything and have to put on a smile and pretend everything's fine. Then sometimes I'll drag myself to the gym for an hour after work then go home and either go out to the bar by myself or just drink at home. Then I wake up and go through the motions all over again. I can't find enjoyment in anything any more.

Thanks to anyone who actually read all that shit.

Sorry to hear bro. When I hit my teens I got a massive wave of depression and started isolating myself from all my friends and people in general and I'd say it's important to break yourself out that shit before you get used to the routine. I'm 32 now and I haven't had any real friends or relationships since I was 13. Although I'm over depression because of meds, it's tough to get out and socialize because it so far outside my comfort zone and I don't have the social skills anyway. Prolonged isolation prob isn't the healthiest

Have you ever seen doc about your depression? For me it was a long process to get the meds right but once we did it turned me around completely

 

[Satur9]

Depression has not left me alone for over 20 years. It's hard, and every day is a struggle. Stopped drinking and smoking about a month ago, so it helped me a bit.

Wish I had the answers for peeps in our situation but I don't. Good luck out there, y'all.

 

[Clippy]

My back don't work. It's getting harder and harder to stay positive. Can't finish renovations. Wife's fam is finishing it for me. Physio therapist said I can't bend or twist of even walk hills. I can't do shit and feel useless

 

[ehtheist]

Little things tend to work. Depression and whatnot are big problems, but they're built small - piece by piece by piece. They get out of hand when they've been allowed to snowball minute by minute, hour by hour, week by week.

This being the case, I tend to keep anxiety and general malaise in check through strict and small practices - types of meditation, if you will. You basically run off the negativity by interrupting the times it starts to build with strict methodical activities which block the negative thought patterns from really taking over.

One of my person favourites is Gong Fu Cha, the Chinese tea ceremony. You get a tiny little pot like this:

(would easily fit in the palm of your hand)

Then some high quality tea, a kettle/pot, and some small cups. Put a set amount of tea in the pot (a heaping tablespoon, roughly). You carefully boil the water paying attention to the size of the bubbles as that indicates the temperature you need. Then you pour in the water, leave it for 2 seconds, and pour it down the drain rinsing the tea leaves. Then you pour the water in again, leave it for about 5 to 15 seconds (depending on tea variety) and pour the whole pot (not even a full cup) into your cup, or several cups if you're doing this socially. Drink, making sure to do a few tricks to get the tea flavours to come out (slurp it with your lips/tongue to let oxygen in). Then, repeat the steps with the same leaves, slightly differently each time as the character of the leaves change with multiple steepings, upwards of 10 times depending on the type of tea.

You tend to want a different tea pot for each type of tea because the oils of different types of tea build up and season your tea pot. Some people have pots which are hundreds of years old, family heirlooms, which brew truly magnificent cups of tea. Part of the practice, part of the meditation, is the slow crafting of your own pot collection, leading to having a pot for pu erh teas, a Formosa oolong, an imperial green, etc etc. The slow, rewarding process of tasting your tea pot slowly produce more nuanced and rich flavour is part of the meditation - another small focus to break up the negative thought patterns, one more little rigorous distraction to draw you away from the big things and let your mind slow down and disentangle.

This may sound like the dumbest, most tedious thing in the world, but what it does it creates a mental pattern of several very precise steps which must be taken just so or the process is ruined, a reward (possibly the most flavourful tea you'll ever drink), and a possibility of doing it better (if the tea is bitter, the water was too hot, or the tea steeped too long). This is a process of several small steps which you are very intimately engaged in, measuring every action to the second, and slowly mastering a process which is subtle, demanding, and rewarding. The constant repetition, the small acts, and the engagement in a veritable artform of tea making, is a very meditative process. A few steepings in - after minutes of counting seconds for steepings, paying close attention to the size of bubbles in boiling water to control temperature, and so on, and your mind gets into a rhythm of tea making, slowing down your thoughts, focusing them away from the things on your mind.

Sometimes when I am overwhelmed, stressed, or outright depressed, I will literally spend an hour practicing Gong Fu Cha and by the end of it my mind has imperceptibly slowed down and focused on the finesse of making tea.

Rigorous, structured, meditative practices like this work for a lot of people - whether it's yoga, tai chai, gong fu cha, painting figurines, working in your garden, or even something at organizing/re-organizing a room in your house. There is something different for everyone and, again, for many a rigorous practice that is sort of outside of one's regular life is an exceptional remedy for one's mental ailments. Our society tends to draw one out of and away from these types of rigorous practices but it would do us all well to have one in our life. The big thing is actually doing them - these things work but part of why is because it is a vehicle by which your tear yourself away from the here, the now, and the rhythm of your life that is causing you distress. It requires focus and discipline, but is also the tool for learning focus and discipline.

 

[45ACP]

Sorry to hear bro. When I hit my teens I got a massive wave of depression and started isolating myself from all my friends and people in general and I'd say it's important to break yourself out that shit before you get used to the routine. I'm 32 now and I haven't had any real friends or relationships since I was 13. Although I'm over depression because of meds, it's tough to get out and socialize because it so far outside my comfort zone and I don't have the social skills anyway. Prolonged isolation prob isn't the healthiest

Have you ever seen doc about your depression? For me it was a long process to get the meds right but once we did it turned me around completely

Thanks for the response buddy, good to see you here. Good to hear your depression is under control.

Yeah I've been seeing various psychologists and psychiatrists and have been on and off of meds for about 15 years without any real success. Well, no real success with the meds at least. Therapy has helped in certain ways. I'm not currently taking any meds but if I can't seem to shake this on my own I'm open to trying again. I'm definitely at the point where I feel like I need some help.

I don't really understand what's happening. I spent the last 3 or 4 years really fighting to get my head straight and my life on the right track and I was feeling better than I maybe ever had in my life right before I met her. I was happy being myself, being on my own, surrounded by great friends, doing something I love for a career, enjoying hobbies like skateboarding, MMA/BJJ, playing music, etc.

I keep trying to remind myself that I had a great life before I met her and I'll just go back to that now but it doesn't feel the same any more without the purpose I'd found. I'm blowing things off that I used to love to do and I don't like it. I don't even feel like there's any point in the NAGA tournament I was planning on competing in in a couple weeks. Why the fuck does losing this girl make me feel like there's no point in doing something I was only doing for myself anyway because I loved it and found enjoyment in it? I don't like this feeling at all, it's kind of scaring me.

 

[TrippleOG]

I've relapsed unfortunately.

 

[Deleted member 220895]

I'm the type of guy who can't appreciate a good thing when it's happening because I'm to used to having it all taken away from me in an instant. Add manic depression and multiple generations of family members who are bipolar and you have an interesting life. 2 years of therapy changed my whole perspective on my emotional problems and has set me in a great path to understanding myself. It's helpful and a struggle all at once. Right now things are looking the best yet, and I still can't accept it. One day it'll hit me. Either way, my cynicism still hasn't affected my drive no matter what.

 

[wlu.29]

I used to scoff at the notion of mental illness but recently I've had to attend training at work as a leader and it has opened my eyes quite a bit

Mental health is real

 

[Zer]

Thanks for the response buddy, good to see you here. Good to hear your depression is under

Yeah I've been seeing various psychologists and psychiatrists and have been on and off of meds for about 15 years without any real success. Well, no real success with the meds at least. Therapy has helped in certain ways. I'm not currently taking any meds but if I can't seem to shake this on my own I'm open to trying again. I'm definitely at the point where I feel like I need some help.

I don't really understand what's happening. I spent the last 3 or 4 years really fighting to get my head straight and my life on the right track and I was feeling better than I maybe ever had in my life right before I met her. I was happy being myself, being on my own, surrounded by great friends, doing something I love for a career, enjoying hobbies like skateboarding, MMA/BJJ, playing music, etc.

I keep trying to remind myself that I had a great life before I met her and I'll just go back to that now but it doesn't feel the same any more without the purpose I'd found. I'm blowing things off that I used to love to do and I don't like it. I don't even feel like there's any point in the NAGA tournament I was planning on competing in in a couple weeks. Why the fuck does losing this girl make me feel like there's no point in doing something I was only doing for myself anyway because I loved it and found enjoyment in it? I don't like this feeling at all, it's kind of scaring me.

You obviously invested a lot into this girl and had ambitions built up around her, so it's natural right now you're struggling to motivate yourself. It must feel like you've gotta start again from scratch. I think you gotta give it time bro because shit like this is always going to take a mental toll. When I'm at my lowest it's always the little positives that build me back up to where I want to be. It might seem like a chore right now, but you're already dragging yourself to the gym and to bars and all that and eventually I think that shit will pay off. They're better environments for you. Worst thing you can do is sit around at home alone

 

[45ACP]

You obviously invested a lot into this girl and had ambitions built up around her, so it's natural right now you're struggling to motivate yourself. It must feel like you've gotta start again from scratch. I think you gotta give it time bro because shit like this is always going to take a mental toll. When I'm at my lowest it's always the little positives that build me back up to where I want to be. It might seem like a chore right now, but you're already dragging yourself to the gym and to bars and all that and eventually I think that shit will pay off. They're better environments for you. Worst thing you can do is sit around at home alone

Thanks again. I think what I'm doing with this self-destruction I learned from her. We split up a few times in the past and when it was me trying to walk away she'd relapse and let her life spiral completely out of control. She doesn't really have any close friends or other support besides her parents so she'd come back to me begging for help. And I loved her so much I couldn't ever say no. It's hard to admit but I think I might be doing this to myself to get her attention. There's part of me that's still desperate to keep her around and make things work and I know that it's worked in reverse (me taking her back because she was so desperate for help when she'd relapse).

She tells me she's worried and has been trying to be there for me but I know me acting like this is only pushing her farther away, she's just frustrated with me at this point because I'm being stubborn. Negative attention is better than no attention I guess. I know I can't keep this cycle going though. I know if I keep her in my life in this way eventually she'll find someone else and I'll still be stuck on her and be even more devastated over knowing she's moved on.

I'm just doing everything wrong. My brain is telling me all the right things to do, to let her go, accept that it wasn't working, lay off the drinking, spend more time at the gym and with friends, get back to some of the things I enjoy that had fallen to the way-side during our relationship, etc. But then my heart just keeps reminding me of how special what we had was, how it was everything I'd always been looking for, how it gave me purpose, how I'd finally found someone who seemed to 'get' me, who made me feel like I wasn't alone and that I was accepted and loved for who I was. That I was better with her than I was on my own. How I might never find something like this again and that it's too valuable and rare to give up on. I can't seem to accept that I don't have any control over it and I can't figure out how to let go.

So I drink to numb the pain. I self medicate. It's been my go-to coping mechanism for a long time and it's now also a way I can get her attention. I feel like a pussy ass bitch I know I'm stronger than this and I'm behaving like a pathetic loser.

 

[HomeRun916]

Life is hard. Try to find people who really care about you and surround yourself with them. Good luck.