Anxiety and Depression Support

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Anxiety & Depression is Affecting Everyone | You Can Help!

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COVID-19 has taken an unprecedented toll on our mental health, with studies revealing global increases in anxiety and depression and a sharp spike in the demand for treatment since earlier this year.

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These next few weeks, as we enter our final giving campaign of the year and look ahead to 2021, we are turning to you - our Health Unlocked supporters and friends - to help ensure that ADAA can continue its focus on improving the quality of life for people with anxiety disorders and depression by providing free evidence-based educational resources and support.

Anxiety disorders and depression are real, serious, and treatable. Your tax-deductible gift will help improve the lives of millions around the world. Thank you!

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10 Replies

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My husband has covid and we are quarantined in the house together. He is on day 7 and we didn't know that he had it until day 5 when he tested positive. I tested and was negative. So far I have no symptoms. My health anxiety is over the moon, I cry at the anything. I am constantly cleaning but doom is right around the corner! Please help!

With GAD, dysthymia and double depression, I know what it is to want to cry over anything or even nothing. But the Apostle Paul gives us sound advice for anyone, but, as I discovered, for people like us:

6 Do not be anxious about anything, but in every situation, by prayer and petition, with thanksgiving, present your requests to God. 7 And the peace of God, which transcends all understanding, will guard your hearts and your minds in Christ Jesus.

8 Finally, brothers and sisters, whatever is true, whatever is noble, whatever is right, whatever is pure, whatever is lovely, whatever is admirable—if anything is excellent or praiseworthy—think about such things.

I don't claim to have this mastered but it does help A LOT. When those of us who are vulnerable to anxiety triggers give in to the bad thought patterns, this creates a biochemical rut in our brains that gets deeper and deeper and harder and harder to get out of, and will eventually put you into a tailspin that will be extremely difficult to recover from.

The good news is that the reverse is also true -- when you are focused on happy things, it creates a good biochemical rut, and it starts to slowly fill in the bad one. I keep a list of happy memories and times and ongoing things and focus on them when my stomach gets tense or bad thought patterns loom.

Wow very well said. I love that scripture and Paul is awesome. Some have gone as far to theorize ( not that I agree with or disagree with- just found it interesting, ) that when he was struck so strongly with "the voice of God" and fell from his horse on the road to Damascus that he was having a psychotic episode. Not to take anything from this brilliant illuminated Apostle. Just an interesting theory. DV

😊

His writings just don't reflect someone suffering from psychosis so that theory may have to be abandoned.

Today was hard for me. Where I live in we finally got some much-needed rain. The rain made it too cold to go outside. I would have like to try and take a walk to clear my thoughts.

I’m the only one of my siblings living in this state. It’s hard to live with family and with this pandemic, it makes missing them more amplified. (However, I moved here to get away from them.)

I moved to my new city almost two years. (It will be two years in June 2021). Because of the pandemic I was not able to get out and meet anyone but the neighbors in front of me and on both sides of where I live. We speak when we see each other out and do the social distance thing.

I guess I’m feeling overwhelmed because today is January 28, 2021. On January 7, my best friend who died three months after my deceased husband, had her birthday. With February 5, (February 5 was my deceased husband’s birthday). I know that these two birthdays are triggers for the anxiety, depression and bereavement that I am feeling. This happens each year and it does not make it easier.

So, I came here to this site because of COVID-19 I am still not comfortable trying to go to therapy at my local hospital.

I figured I would just post here and hope for the best. When my triggers for the anxiety, depression and bereavement come into play I don’t sleep well. I normally don’t go to bed until about 2:30 or 3 am in the morning. I state this because I can feel like I’m sleepy but as soon as I lay down and just before I am about to fall asleep. I will have a panic anxiety attack, that relates to dying. My dying or am dying. This will wake me up, I will cry or tell myself I am safe. I will do several deep breathing techniques for several minutes after a while this will calm me down and I normally will fall back to sleep and sleep for about four to five hours. I watched this happen each year, it starts normally around Christmas time and last well into March.

I currently do live with someone who has woken me up from nightmares before. The nightmares normally start around the holidays. To me they signal that this bereavement is coming. The only problem is that this year or should I say in December when I had a nightmare, I didn’t feel it was a nightmare because I remember talking in my dream and asking if it was a dream and telling someone in the dream that I wanted to know why they wanted me to have the dream I was in, because I wasn’t feeling like a “victim” in fact I felt the opposite. Anyone, I woke up from that dream. I haven’t had another one since. I had the dream in December just before Christmas.

Also, a relative of mine died in November. He’d lived in Las Vegas and I wasn’t able to make to his service in Las Vegas. His wife then took him to Chicago to bury him and my siblings who lived there went to the serve that was there.

Also, in December before Christmas I had two friends of my deceased husband pass away. I was not able to attend either service.

Anyway, I am feeling lonely and depressed right now and feel it has to be an “extended” bereavement due to the recent passing.

Hope you don’t mind my sharing.

Thank you.

Thank you Seeking2, for sharing your life's journey with your losses and depression.

I am very sorry for all the losses you have experienced in the last 5 years. Since we all grieve

in our own way and in our own time, you most likely are coming to terms with death being inevitable which can certainly stir up some deep emotions.

I remember as far back as being a child and on occasion would try to comprehend what that

must be like to never exist again. But I'd immediately put it out of my mind and go on and play.

As we get older and we start to see friends and family leaving us too soon, the loneliness and sadness takes a place in our mind. It's not surprising that during those several months of having lost both your husband and best friend that your anxiety levels rise. Your dreams are an awareness of what your subconscious mind has stored away and plays it back during that

time of the year.

I believe that this Pandemic has brought out not only a lot of fear but a lot of loneliness for many people who never really suffer from mental illness.

I congratulate you for taking the first step forward today by joining in on this amazing forum. This will become your safe place to vent or talk about your fears and worries to a group of caring, understanding people.

I'm very happy to Welcome you and hope you find some comfort in knowing you are not alone. Nice meeting you new friend xx

Hi Agora1, I agree with you about this Pandemic bringing about a lot of loneliness for people. I find that when I am in the grocery store, folks want to chit chat. I don't mind, I want to talk too. I saw on TV one day that one of the TV host said we all have undergone Trauma from this Pandemic. I believe this too is true because of all my friends and love ones who have passed away during the Pandemic and my having to adjust to a "new way" of seeing funerals. Since I could not attend I have been viewing online and making that adjustment. I am truly grateful that this forum is here. Yes it has provided me with comfort and I look forward to staying in touch. Thank you for being here.

👍

I’m so sorry you have had such losses and must be hard to live with. I just started on this site and like to share my feelings as well and it does help me focus on the present. I also have coloring books and just bought a puzzle to keep me busy since I’m retired and live alone. I have neighbors that I’ve gotten to know and that helps. Hope you settle in to your new place soon and welcome to our site.

Thank you for getting back to me. And thank you for your encouragement. Yes, I do have some wonderful neighbors. We speak and whenever we catch each other out gathering the mail or putting out the trash. We chit chat. They've shared with me many places to take a walk etc. I am retired also. I moved here because the San Francisco Bay area got too expensive to live there and where I'm at it only a couple hours away. Like you I took up a hobby. I write romance novels and love to garden. I brought myself two new rose bushes. They are the "root" kind, which are cheaper this time of year. I already planted them. When I moved here I planted four roses bushes. I have all my favorite colors except for purple. I haven't been able to find any yet. I fell in love with purple roses at the Claremont Hotel in Berkley California. I went there for Brunch many years ago and they had the most beautiful rose garden I have even seen. Well, as you can see I do love to write. I'll close for now. Thanks again for sharing with me. Take care.

Purple is my favorite color and if you see some roses please send a picture. I live in Oklahoma so still to cold to plant any roses. Interesting that your a writer, do you ever try to get your stories published?

When I was married my husband and I used to go to San Francisco to raise money to drill oil wells. There is a lot of oil almost the main industry out here. In SF we would eat at a restaurant called Scoma’s on the wharf. It was so beautiful that I wanted to stay but now I’ve heard it’s not as nice with the homeless living on the streets.

I do get lonely living alone so I found this site for some conversation. I like to stay home too and read.

Good to visit with you