When I was young I was pretty good at drawing birds and dogs. My dad used to compliment me all the time. Today I can’t draw for peanuts! I try and try to get my talent back but it’s gone. What the hell is wrong with me? I have no patience yet expect to produce masterpieces. [...]
Archive for the ‘Depression’ Category
I’m no Picasso!
Posted in Codependency, Coping Mechanisms, Depression, Dysfunctional Behavior, Self Love, Thoughts, tagged ACOA, adult child, alcoholic home, approval seeking, expectations, fear of failure, Inner Child, perfectionism, self love, self sabotage on June 12, 2011 | 6 Comments »
I Am Alone
Posted in 12 Step, Addiction, Codependency, Coping Mechanisms, Depression, Poetry, Relationships, SAnon, Self Love, Thoughts, tagged 12 Step Program, ACOA, addiction, adult child, alcoholic home life, alcoholism, childhood grief, codependency, codependent relationships, Depression, dysfunctional families, God, Inner Child, internal misery, poetry, sadness, SAnon, self love on April 26, 2011 | 3 Comments »
There is nobody here to share my sorrow There is nobody here to cut the ball and chain of my responsibilities, my chores To allow me to run and play like a carefree child, to think of happy things and make daisy chains in the sun When will someone hear my cry? You walk away and leave [...]
Running on Empty
Posted in 12 Step, Codependency, Depression, Relationships, SAnon, Self Harm, Self Love, Suicide, Thoughts, tagged ACOA, adult child, alanon, alcoholic home, alcoholism, Alone, codependency, Depression, Inner Child, isolation, loneliness, sadness, SAnon, Self Harm, self love, stuck on April 2, 2011 | 7 Comments »
As an adult child of an alcoholic I often feel so alone in this world. Nobody understands me, nobody gets me, nobody will feel the pain and sadness I feel inside. Imagine a car stalled in the middle of a major highway and all the other cars whizzing by, not noticing it’s there. It wants some help, so badly [...]
Living in the Solution
Posted in 12 Step, Codependency, Depression, Relationships, Thoughts, tagged ACA, ACOA, adult children, adult children of alcoholics, belief systems, coaddiction, codependency, control, Depression, dysfunctional families, dysfunctional family, dysfunctional upbrinings, family of origin, living in the problem, self help on March 9, 2011 | 4 Comments »
I wanted to post an update on my post below “Repeating my Childhood” because a few wonderful people commented on it for which I’m grateful. During my “unmanageable” moment I was thinking things such as “Here goes another weekend down the drain”, “I hate my life” , “I’m so weak” and “The sewing machine is broken [...]
Dear John – Dysfunctional Childhood?
Posted in 12 Step, Addiction, Anxiety, Depression, mental illness, Thoughts, tagged 12 Step Program, AA, Abusive Childhood, addiction, adult children, adult children of alcoholics, alcoholics anonymous, alcoholism, Anxiety disorder, childhood depression, depression and alcoholism, dysfunctional childhood, dysfunctional thinking, Health, Major depressive disorder, mental health, mental illness on December 28, 2010 | 3 Comments »
I received an email yesterday and thought I’d share it with you together with my reply: “Dear X, My name is X. I am almost certain now that I was born with a mental illness. I was diagnosed when I was thirty-five I am now forty-one. I realised something was wrong when I was sixteen,and so began my personal war,I have [...]
My Life’s on Hold
Posted in 12 Step, Anxiety, Codependency, Depression, Thoughts, tagged 12 Step, ACOA, adult child, agoraphobia, alcoholic home, anxiety, codependency, Depression, Disorders, excessive worry, Facebook, fear of situations, Health, life on hold, mental health, panic disorder, phobia, reluctant thoughts, Support group, Support Groups, triggers, Twelve Step, Twelve-step program, uncontrollable fear, What might happen on October 17, 2010 | 9 Comments »
I was recently thinking about someone who I befriended on Facebook at my last 12 Step meeting because we were talking about how people (me included) don’t commit to things until the last minute or we say NO “just incase” something bad will happen. She invited me to her birthday party and she is such a lovely person and I [...]
Stay Away from Mentally Ill?
Posted in 12 Step, Addiction, Anxiety, bipolar disorder, Depression, mental illness, Relationships, Schizophrenia, Self Help/Support Groups, Thoughts, tagged agressive friends, agressive mentally ill, anxiety, bipolar disorder, Borderline personality disorder, depressed person, destructive mental illness, detaching from mentally ill, Disorders, Health, helping mentally ill, how to help mentally ill, major depressive illness, manipulative friends, manipulative mentally ill, Mental disorder, mental health, mental illness, mentally ill friend, Support group on October 17, 2010 | 2 Comments »
I recently responded to a request for experience strength and hope in dealing with toxic families who have mental illnesses and possible personality disorders. This is what I said: “I have a fair bit of experience with mental illness as it runs in my family of origin (depression, anxiety, bipolar, schizophrenia) plus I have [...]
My First Codependency Meeting
Posted in 12 Step, Addiction, Anxiety, Codependency, Depression, mental illness, Thoughts, tagged 12 Step Program, agoraphobia, alcoholic home life, anxiety, CODA, codependency, codependent behaviour, Depression, Disorders, Health, Major depressive disorder, mental health, self love, unselfish behaviour on September 25, 2010 | Leave a Comment »
Went to my very first codependency 12 Step meeting yesterday. I was very surprised about how much I related to people’s shares and the readings and how much of my behaviour was codependent behaviour. Who would have thought that the need to come bearing gifts when I visited people was codependent behaviour. Apparently the reasoning behind always needing [...]
Sex & Love Addiction Help
Posted in 12 Step, Addiction, Anxiety, bipolar disorder, Books, Codependency, Depression, Medication, mental illness, SAnon, Self Harm, Self Help/Support Groups, Thoughts, tagged Amazon.com, American Psychiatric Association, Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of Mental Disorders, Love Addiction, love addiction help, love addiction suicide, love addicts, love avoidants, love fantasies, Obsessive–compulsive disorder, Patrick Carnes, romance fantasies, SA, SAnon, sex addict, sex addiction suicide, Sex Addicts Anonymous, Sexual addiction, sexual fantasies, sexual thoughts, Sexuality, SLAA, Substance dependence, Twelve-step program, unwanted fantasies on September 11, 2010 | 2 Comments »
As I suffer from generalised anxiety disorder and various OCD symptoms such as the need to have things orderly, clean and perfect, I was wondering whether love and sex addiction is classed a form of OCD. Some experts believe that sexual addiction is literally an addiction, directly analogous to alcohol and drug addictions. Other experts believe [...]
Suicidal Ideations, PMT & Antipsychotics
Posted in bipolar disorder, Depression, Medication, mental illness, Self Harm, Suicide, Thoughts, tagged benzodiazepine overdose, benzodiazepines, benzos, irregular periods & suicide, Jenny Birdsey, natural progesterone, natural progesterone cream, NPAN, overdose, PMS, PMT, progesterone deficiency, Self Harm, suicidal ideations, Suicide, suicide and PMT, valium overdose on September 1, 2010 | 1 Comment »
What’s the point of writing a Blog if I can’t talk about the “hard stuff”? Should I gloss my posts over so they don’t trigger people? Yes, maybe a little but there’s no point in hiding the truth from the world because the world won’t understand where it went wrong if people like me fudge [...]
Eliminating Brain Fog from Medications
Posted in Depression, fatigue, Food, Medication, mental illness, Thoughts, tagged anti depressant side effects, brain fog, clouded mind, depression and brain fog, depression and focus, focus issues, inability to concentrate, lack of concentration, lack of focus, low concentration, medication foginess, medication side effects on August 31, 2010 | Leave a Comment »
One major problem I’ve found when dealing with many people who try their best to hold down employment is their in ability to concentrate/focus on what is required. I know with me, I used to read line after line after line until I got the information to actually sink into my brain. This kind of [...]
Seasonal Affective Disorder (S.A.D)
Posted in Depression, mental illness, Thoughts, tagged depression and SAD, depression and weather, Depression and winter, Mental Illness and weather, mental illness and winter, SAD, Seasonal Affective Disorder, winter blues on August 15, 2010 | Leave a Comment »
Ever lived your days waiting for the sun to come out or hoping that tomorrow the sun will shine so you can have a GOOD day? I have and I am doing so this Winter. I’m calling this a mild case of SAD. If the sun ain’t out then I’m hibernating! My mood drops, my [...]
The Illness or the Medication?
Posted in bipolar disorder, Depression, Medication, mental illness, Thoughts, tagged bipolar disorder, dont feel sick, Efexor, illness or medication, medication, mental illness, symptoms, Zeldox on August 15, 2010 | Leave a Comment »
The trouble with mental illness and medications is it’s so difficult to figure out whether what you are going through is because of your illness or your medication/s! I call it the chicken or the egg scenario. For instance, am I numb from post traumatic stress disorder OR from too much Efexor? Am I tired because [...]
WOW looking back now at all my posts I cannot believe how far I have come!
Posted in Depression, mental illness, Self Harm, Suicide, Zeldox Ziprasidone Geodon, tagged antipsychotics, geodon, overcoming depression, overcoming mental illness, overdose, Zeldox, Zeldox suicide on July 31, 2009 | Leave a Comment »
I cannot believe I wrote the last post I wrote in Feb 09. Reading my content shocks me. It reminds me how terrible mental illness is to experience. I never ever want to go back there. I am not like that anymore and never want to be that way again. It saddens me to see [...]
Get Ready to be Amazed at Australia’s Mental Health System
Posted in bipolar disorder, Depression, mental illness, tagged antipsychotics, anxiety, australias mental health system, bipolar disorder, CAT team, Depression, mental health system, psychiatrists, Zeldox on February 10, 2009 | 1 Comment »
It’s been a while since i’ve written here but much has happened I can assure you of that. You will notice I have charted my symptoms at the header of my blog. These are a month and a half’s worth of symptoms which have helped me immensely in the past few weeks. It all started when I [...]
Sharing With You
Posted in bipolar disorder, Depression, mental illness, Self Harm, Suicide, tagged bipolar disorder, contributing factors to suicide, Depression, overdosing, suicidal thoughts, Suicide, suicide prevention, suicide warning signs on September 6, 2008 | 6 Comments »
What a night i’ve had. I’m writing this post in the hope that no one in my family reads it. I’ve made the mistake of telling them my blog address and every now and then they go to it to check out what i’ve been writing. I’ve thought about closing my blog down due to [...]
Smile For Life
Posted in bipolar disorder, Depression, mental illness, tagged emotion, happiness, sad demeanour, serious demeanour, smile, wellbeing on August 31, 2008 | 4 Comments »
I really hate it when people say I should smile more. For those who don’t know me, I have a serious demeanour. I don’t remember always having this demeanour but certainly over the past few years I have come to notice it more and more. It could be a result of my bipolar disorder or [...]
Do I Look Bipolar?
Posted in bipolar disorder, Depression, mental illness, tagged anxiety, bipolar disorder, Depression, looking normal, mental illness, strains of mental illness on August 31, 2008 | 2 Comments »
I know it’s been a while since i’ve blogged on here. It’s been hard to get the motivation up and hard to think of new topics all the time to write about to keep readers interested. One thing I worry about is whether I look bipolar to other people. I think I can tell when [...]
Nutrition Beats Mental Illness
Posted in bipolar disorder, Depression, fatigue, mental illness, tagged bipolar disorder, Chronic Fatigue, chronic nutritional deficiencies, Depression, depression and nutrition, diet changes, dietician, fatigue, food allergies, food deficiencies, Foods that Beat Depression, mental health, nutrition, nutrition counsellor, Schizophrenia, seratonin, vitamin supplments, vitamins on August 13, 2008 | 8 Comments »
I’ve decided to go and see an nutritionist. While googling “depression and nutrition” I came across these case histories that I wanted to share with you. Liz started suffering from depression at the age of 14. By the time she was 17 she had become extremely anxious, fearful and depressed and was hearing voices. She [...]
Foods That Fight Depression
Posted in Depression, fatigue, tagged Alexandra Massey, Foods that fight depression, Foods to Beat Depression, Foods to Boost Your Mood, Super Foods on August 11, 2008 | Leave a Comment »
Hello Lisa You don’t know what tremendous satisfaction it gives me to hear your story. Having changed my own food patterns for the better and knowing that, yes I really can, change the way I feel – to then write a book and read the results you are having makes it feel worth all the [...]
Foods to Beat Depression/Fatigue
Posted in Depression, fatigue, tagged changing eating patterns, Chronic Fatigue, Depression, diet changes, dieting, emotional welbeing, fatigue, Foods that Beat Depression, Foods to Boost Your Mood, lethargy, Mood Boost, Mood Changes, Over, overcoming depression, overcoming fatigue, seratonin rich foods, stress, Super Foods, tiredness on August 10, 2008 | 6 Comments »
It’s been one week since i’ve changed my diet and I feel great. I have to admit I was skeptical at first when I bought the book Super Foods to Boost Your mood, Foods that Fight Depression for a measley $5.00AU but figured if there were foods out there that could change my mood then [...]
What is Normal?
Posted in bipolar disorder, Depression, mental illness, tagged being normal, bipolar disorder, bipolar medication, medication, normalicy and bipolar disorder, personality traits, Zeldox on August 2, 2008 | 4 Comments »
Some people think that bipolar disorder doesn’t dictate who they are as a person. I often find this hard to believe because almost everything I do, think or say is affected by the illness. I even regulate my personality through medication. The type of medication I take determines my personality traits. For instance, when I take [...]
Helping a Depressed Person
Posted in bipolar disorder, Depression, tagged assisting recovery, bipolar disorder, Depression, Helping a depressed person, mental illness, recovering from a mental illness, supporting a depressed person, supporting bipolar disorder, supporting mental illness, understanding a depressed person, understanding depression, understanding mental illness on July 25, 2008 | Leave a Comment »
I remember when I had a relapse of bipolar disorder about five months ago that I didn’t get a lot of support when I needed it most. My partner found it very difficult to cope with my endless sleeping and lack of enthusiasm towards life. I remember having to psych myself up for half an [...]
Hallucinations
Posted in bipolar disorder, Depression, mental illness, Schizophrenia, tagged auditory hallucinations, bipolar disorder, bipolar I disorder, bipolar II disorder, dellusions, hallucinations, hypomania, Schizophrenia on July 22, 2008 | 1 Comment »
Hallucinations may occur in any of the senses: auditory (for example, hearing voices or music), gustatory (for example, unpleasant tastes), olfactory (for example, unpleasant smells), somatic (for example, a feeling of “electricity”), tactile (for example, a sensation of being touched, or “skin crawling” sensations), visual (for example, flashes of light, colors or images). Delusions (fixed, false, [...]
Why Do People Suicide
Posted in Depression, Self Harm, tagged alcohol, cannabis, cannabis and depression, cannabis and suicide, cannabis smoking, Depression, drug use and depression, drug use and suicide, drugs, Marijuana, marijuana and depression, marijuana and suicide, passive cannabis smoking, Suicide, Why do people suicide on July 12, 2008 | 1 Comment »
Most of the time people who suicide are very sick with depression or one of the other types of depressive illnesses, which occur when the chemicals in a person’s brain get out of balance or become disrupted. Healthy people do not suicide. A person who has depression does not think like a typical person who [...]
I Can Do Anything
Posted in bipolar disorder, Depression, tagged bipolar disorder, black dog institute, delusions, delusions of grandeur, Depression, grandeur, grandiose ideas, hypomania, mania on July 1, 2008 | 2 Comments »
People with delusions of grandeur may exhibit a drastically exaggerated sense of self-importance or may believe that they are a famous person or religious figure. They may believe they can do anything, believing they are vastly superior to those around them. They can have inflated self esteem and false beliefs in special abilities. Delusions of [...]
Depression & Fatigue
Posted in Depression, Mental Health News, tagged chronic fatigue syndrome, Depression, fatigue, overcoming fatigue on July 1, 2008 | 1 Comment »
With depression comes fatigue. Some antidepressants can reduce the amount of fatigue a depressed person feels. Very rarely am I energetic without a Berocca (vitamin B) and a can of Coke every day. Red Bull or other energy drinks also remove the fatigue by boosting the body’s caffeine intake. A European study has found evidence that depression [...]
Working Full Time with a Mental Illness
Posted in Depression, tagged coping strategies, Depression, mental illness, working full time on June 24, 2008 | 2 Comments »
Working full time with a mental illness is not easy. Sometimes you feel like you don’t want to get up out of bed and go to work but you force yourself up and out into the new day. If your mental illness is affecting your ability to do things such as concentrating or communicating effectively, [...]
I Hate Mondays
Posted in Depression, tagged Bright Light Therapy, Depression, Mondays, SAD, Seasonal Affective Disorder, Sundays, Winter on June 23, 2008 | Leave a Comment »
Out of all the days of the week I especially hate Mondays. I always feel like crap on a Monday. I’m sitting at work writing this. I am a Law Clerk and I should be working but instead I feel like blogging or doing something totally unrelated to work. Sundays and Mondays are particularly depressing [...]
Don’t Take NO for an Answer
Posted in Depression, tagged Depression, doctor, drugs, psychiatrist on June 18, 2008 | Leave a Comment »
If you’re depressed and you don’t already have a Doctor or Psychiatrist you’re seeing, visit your local Doctor and get a referral. Speak to your Doctor about your depression. If money is a problem and you can’t afford a private Psychiatrist call the local Crisis Assessment Team at your local hospital. They will be able to [...]
The Benefits of Keeping a Diary
Posted in Depression, tagged diary, expressing feelings, journalling, writing on June 15, 2008 | 2 Comments »
My Psychologist always tells me that when I have a problem to “write it down”. I have started a diary on and off over the last 12 months. Usually I get bored with the process once the depression lifts. What I have found of benefit is when I am feeling low or something is bothering [...]
Overcoming Depression – a Great Resource
Posted in Depression, tagged bipolar, overcoming depression, treatment on June 11, 2008 | Leave a Comment »
Here’s a great link to overcoming depression. Best of all it’s free! I found it very useful. I wrote down some of the statements the information suggests you repeat to yourself which helped me somewhat. Combat thoughts of helplessness by reading or by repeating, “I made myself depressed over that. I didn’t have to respond that way.” [...]
