Overworking...

[anxiousrecoverer]

Hi, it's been a while since I wrote a blog as I was feeling a little better, but I wanted to write today.

I've recently been for schema therapy, which has been useful in identifying my patterns even in the first two sessions. Schema therapy aims to identify long-running patterns in your life that you are repeating over and over. My main schema, apparently, is self-sacrifice, which is where others' needs are put ahead of your own, but you don't even realise because you've lost touch with your own needs anyway. This makes sense to me as one of my biggest problems I've been going to therapy for is that I am not able to identify what emotions I am suffering, what I want, or what I need in life, but instead feel that I am living according to a set of responsibilities. It had started to become clear to me earlier this year that I felt under pressure and that my life had become bereft of fun (which is no good at all, particularly when you're in your mid-20s!), so it's relieving to have someone explain to me this schema theory and how I may have ended up in this position.

One of the patterns I was told was common among people with this schema fits me exactly. Apparently, many people with this schema are misdiagnosed as bipolar (as I have been) because their lives go in cycles of being extremely busy and working/socialising all hours of the day and night; and then sudden collapses/breakdowns in which they are too ill to function. This pattern has been blighting my life since my first total collapse when I was 19. Although this looks like bipolarity from the outside, the difference is that moods don't change from being ecstatic to being depressed, but rather stay at various levels of anxiety and dysthymia throughout the different stages. What perpetuates the cycle is that as soon as the person has enough energy to start functioning, they start doing EVERYTHING because they are incapable of saying no to people, and because I also have the 'Unrelenting standards' schema (pathological need for achievement!) I also put work ahead of my life - kind of by choice - because it seems more important to me.

In the autumn I finally had enough of feeling completely exhausted and majorly ill (like flu everyday) for months and asked for antidepressants. They gave me energy, so I frantically began rebuilding my life. I have been successful in this. I am part self-employed and I have raised my income by 6k per annum since September because I have taken on and retained so many clients. I have also started trying to reach my own goals (achievements) by restarting work I do for myself (in writing and music). This has now left me working six days a week with about two hours left to socialise on a Saturday and no time at all to spend with my boyfriend, to clean, and for a couple of days per week over the last month, to eat hot meals. Today I have been working since 8am. I will continue working until 9pm. I am exhausted. I wish I could stop doing this.

Basically, I guess I'm writing this because it's funny how you can be told what your patterns are and you can see them in your life and say 'yes, you're absolutely right', but that doesn't stop you from doing them. For other people it is simple - stop working - but I can't. Even when I do 'stop working' I haven't really. I feel compelled to check my work email first thing in the morning and if someone phones me late and night and begs me to complete some work for them I feel bad for them and will do it without thinking. Before long I will find myself re-entering the 'dip' in the cycle and having to take time off work/off socialising/off everything to lie very still until I recover again.

I'm just wondering, has anyone else had schema therapy and been shown their patterns? And how have you worked at breaking those patterns?

[sasays]

Hi AR, Youre therapy sounds fantastic, are you continuing to do it now or was it just a few sessions? Is there any follow up at all?

I can totally relate to this - 'I guess I'm writing this because it's funny how you can be told what your patterns are and you can see them in your life and say 'yes, you're absolutely right', but that doesn't stop you from doing them.' - I'm a few weeks into IPT (Interpersonal Therapy) and i have the same throught as yours floating around me constantly. This is me, i can explain these decisions, and despite the effect theyve had on me, i would probably make them again because thats what makes me, me.

'My main schema, apparently, is self-sacrifice, which is where others' needs are put ahead of your own, but you don't even realise because you've lost touch with your own needs anyway.' - I completed a sheet in my last session which asked me about the difficulties i find in relationships (of any kind), from something i had said to her she had asked me to jot down 'i enter relationships without knowing what my needs are' to which i responded 'isnt that normal?' Personally i dont ever feel my 'needs' are all that relevant because im only going to focus on the other person anyway and i have a habit of attracting people who are going through things and need some support, then when life is good they're off! Its exhausting.

Anyway sorry hun i didnt mean to rabit on about me, it seems to be all i do on here, its quite addictive, i dont do this in 'real' life at all!

I'm really happy that you think youve found the right diagnosis for you anddo hope that youre getting some follow up support, and if not perhaps it would be worth looking into.

You're sound very sucessful and thats amazing but dont burn yourself out. I can understand the sense of achivement can be addictive but perhaps you could try and transer some of this to more low stress activities. How about a weekly date night with the bf where you stay in, watch a film and maybe cook something new each week (achivement!). I know its easier said than done but try not to neglect the relationships with those around you. When you think back on your life it wont be your work you remember, Your memories will be treasured forever so make sure you make some good ones. Perhaps you could do something drastic and take a year out to travel the world together? A mix of both intense organisation and amazing memories and together chill time could be amazing.

Think about what you'd like to look back on in old age and what will make you smile, and try your best to make those things happen xx

[mausimouse]

Hi I found this really interesting. For absolutely ages I have been saying if I do too much it makes me anxious and depressed, but on the other hand when I feel well, I just pack loads in to each day. And yes largely for other people, particularly my 2 children and I find it difficult to include my needs. To be quite honest I don't even know if I know what they are any more. It makes me feel better about for myself if I do things for others, I don't achieve the same satisfaction if I do things for myself.

It is constantly a vicious cycle for me, do loads then feel crap for weeks afterwards. I am trying very hard to change this pattern but am not finding it at all easy. It is half term next week and after having a bad week last week feeling better this week I am making mad plans about what to do with the kids everyday during half term. Just the wrong thing to do but I don't know any different way. People say to me learn from what hasn't worked before, don't do much, but I want to be normal and be able to run around doing things and not feel low and anxious afterwards. But most importantly I want to learn how to slip in something nice for me and not feel guilty about it and to actually get pleasure from doing this.

[anxiousrecoverer]

That's often the way for me. I'm thinking 'really shouldn't do this in case it affects my heath' but then I'm annoyed that I have to stop. I'd much rather be busy than not. Besides, I have a terrible time relaxing because I find it so boring! I don't know if it's just my age or if everyone is like that. I enjoy running around and doing things, I don't like sitting down. To me it feels like a waste of time as well when I have so many things I want to do and to me I feel like I've wasted years already by being too ill to get on with things. Why should I have to take it easy? I feel like I should have been a lot further on in life by now, I should have achieved more - I had planned to achieve more - and I blame the whole thing on my illness.

But then I have been told there is another schema - unrelenting standards - that explains these thoughts and behaviours and keeps pushing me and making me really angry when I'm forced to rest due to illness. This now makes it slightly easier for me to understand why others don't view the world the way I do. I can't work out, for instance, why my boyfriend is fine with just going to work everyday, doing the housework, then watching TV. I keep thinking, but what about his life? Doesn't he want to make more of his life? Why isn't he bored and depressed? But then he sees me come home from work and start working on something else and he can't understand that either. He just sees it as me making myself stressed, not as me looking for fulfilment.

Annoyingly, when I have a lot on, it's the work I do for myself that goes out of the window. I enjoy writing and I always spot competitions to enter and I begin to work towards them way in advance, but then my day job will take over, or someone wants me to do something else, or clients start calling me outside of work hours and I agree to do something for them. Once I realise I've got too much on my plate, I don't think 'well I'll just have to stop working so hard', I think 'well, there'll be other competitions'. Over the years I have amassed so many unfinished plays and watched other people who, well, don't work as hard as me live my dreams while I just keep putting mine off. It's weird that it took a therapist to point this schema out to me before I even realised that pattern, it had just never occurred to me before that I should consider the things I want to do for myself and it's ok to make time for those. I thought I was just doing the right thing - being responsible and helpful.