First step is asking for help

[Futurecatlady]

Hello! I’m not sure how this works? But I’m going to give it a try because we’ll im in need of help which i hate to admit.

Last year i was diagnosed with anxiety and depressed, i pretty much had a mental breakdown after my work became infested with bed bugs. I have OCD and well bugs and germs are on my list of things to avoid. I wasn’t sleeping, eating, or leaving my bed if i didn’t have to. I started taking anti anxiety meds and visited a therapist, which started to help.

After i got through all that mess, i was on a better path to manage my mental health. I thought i have been doing good recently but i keep falling into this same depressive state. My motivation is at a -1 if that’s even possible and it’s a struggle everyday for me to do anything besides sleep. I feel like I’m just waiting for 1 more bad thing to happen before i just crawl under my bed and hide.

Any suggestions on how to get me out of this?! I stopped seeing my therapist awhile ago since i switched jobs. I’m also taking an anti-anxiety med daily.

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For myself I found the therapy helped a lot over time. I would consider going back to more therapy. At my toughest spot I sometimes went 2-3 times a week

My wife suffered from OCD actually so I know first hand how difficult it is. Try to remember that there are people who love you and rely on you so if you crawled under your bed you would be missed. I know it’s easier said than done but try and avoid triggers and environments that trigger your ocd

[TheDeparted2141]

This is extremely similar to myself. I started Therapy last year, and did so for about 6 months. It helped, it really did I believe. I got to a point though where I felt there was nothing else really for my therapist to do, we had talked about all my issues and I knew what I was supposed to do to help myself, (or at least I thought)so we just talked about daily things then after that. I stopped going as I started taking anti-depressants, and for a while I was fine. I admit the meds have helped significantly. It's helped though in only certain aspects. Something is missing. I realize now how much it was helping me just to talk to someone. Someone who had no judgement and only wanted to help me.

I'm considering going back to therapy, as it seemed to just lighten my load at times. Perhaps I can find something like that here online, as I've just joined also. I have people I can talk to, but usually they just brush it off as nothing, or change the subject. Most people don't understand how intense and how much of a burden depression is.

I could not agree more with you about having no motivation and just wanting to crawl under the bed. The only thing that has helped me lately is that a while back when I was feeling pretty good I forced myself to get involved with some projects and different things that I really care about. Now they are at a point where they are taking a lot of my time, and as much as I don't want do it or want to just disappear from it, I know that if I don't finish what I've started I will let so many others down. That at least helps me a little to get up in the morning. It's not easy by any means, but I know if I didn't have these obligations I would be spending more time worrying and just beating myself up.

[Futurecatlady in reply to TheDeparted2141]

I feel the same way about therapy! I went for awhile and I’m like okay I’m feeling good and then it just felt like we were re going over things.

That’s also why i joined so i can kind of vent and talk to others who are having similar issues. Which i also think helps because it makes me feel like I’m not alone in this crazy anxiety depression world.

[TheDeparted2141]

Agree completely. Talking with people who know kind of what you are going through or are going through something of their own as well is great. It feels like sometimes I can only talk so much about this stuff to friends or family, like I can't truly tell them everything, either because they get tired of hearing it, don't understand, or don't really think it's that big of deal. That is the thing I'm kind of looking for here is to just be able to unburden and not have to worry about if it's going to change the person's opinion of me, or if I'm going to have to leave parts out for fear of what they may think.

[Futurecatlady in reply to TheDeparted2141]

OMG YES!!!! My family will say I’m just making it up for attention or it’s nothing. And I try to explain it to them and then they get mad. Having mental issues is so hard because people think that since it’s not visible it doesn’t exsist.

[TheDeparted2141 in reply to Futurecatlady]

yes, exactly! I've heard "you don't have it that bad" so many times. It's like they can't understand I'm not talking about my position in life or circumstances, I'm talking about how I feel, how I worry about things I know I have no reason to worry about, and how I have no desire to even do the things I love to do. It's like they think to be "depressed" or have anxiety you have to have crazy horrible incidents occur or trauma. And even some family members that want to help and will listen, they eventually lose interest or don't care anymore because they can't relate or they think there's some simple solution. I don't know how many times I've been told "just get over it". I'm like well if it was that easy believe I would. It's like they think I've never tried to just be happy or that I don't want to be happy. Of course I want to be happy! It just doesn't work that way.

[Futurecatlady in reply to TheDeparted2141]

YES!!!! It’s so hard for people to understand who aren’t in that situation. Every day is a fight and they just don’t understand!