Posted by CareBear04 on January 20, 2005, at 13:55:22
In reply to whining, posted by lonelygal on January 17, 2005, at 13:13:32
lonelygal-- i'm sorry that you continue to feel so bad, but it seems like your situation may finally be following an upward trajectory. when i suggested you look to another T or pdoc for help, i only meant that you should be seen as soon as you need, not that the T you're assigned to is inherently wrong for you. it's great that the T offered to see you sooner than next wednesday.
you sound a lot like me-- self-driven, independent, and liking or somehow taking on a lot of responsibility for other people. i just graduated this year, so all this is still recent and raw for me. i also had a recent depressive crash in october after getting put on narcotic painkillers without a mood stabilizers to keep me from crashing. i was seeing a handful of doctors, and none of them could look past my long list of medications and see me as anything other than a psych mess. none of them could or would help me, and maybe i didn't ask for help hard enough. in any case, i came to feel like they didn't care or believe my pain, physical and psychological. in the end, i realized that what bothered me the most wasn't that they didn't know how to help me. i've learned to take care of myself and not rely on other people, but i do have low self-esteem, too, and i just needed someone to tell me, someone to let me know that my life is worth it-- worth fighting for, worth their effort and mine. my pdoc suggested a stay in the hospital, and my parents, not realizing how bad off i was, complained about the financial cost and made me believe that they valued money over me. regardless of what i believed, in fact only because the drs bullied me into a corner by emphasizing that they didn't believe in the worth of my life, did i rebound back into believing that my life is important. it made me more confident in my ability to help myself. given how my trust was betrayed by doctors and Ts, i also started counting the people who i could trust-- those who have stuck by me through good and bad.
all this babbling is just to say that you sound like the kind of person who likes to help herself. in most all cases, i'm sure you're more than capable of doing that and also of taking on the burdens of others. sometimes, though, you need people there with you to tell you that your life is worth fighting for and that they're with you in the fight. i know it's hard to sacrifice privacy and independence and to ask for help and to tell people how sh*tty you feel. not everyone will be up to helping; some people get scared off or are uncomfortable because they don't know what to say. you haven't talked much about your family. if you have a decent relationship with them, could you let them know how bad you feel in the hope that they won't overreact, but that they will tell you how important you are and how worthwhile the fight is to save and restore your life to its fullest potential? my family hasn't always been supportive, nor have they been consistent about it. sometimes they have doubted the seriousness of my condition, and other times they have smothered me with their worrying.
as for your T, i think the details of what you're feeling are less important than the overall feeling of desperation and unworthiness of help. i think you need to hear from a professional that she is willing to see you through all of this and that you are that important and worth the time and effort that it will take. then, as much as you can talk about it, you can delve into the specifics of what's wrong and maybe you can start addressing small things at a time. but i think you should make clear how bad you feel, and i think she needs to help you believe in her as an ally before any therapy can be useful.
sorry to go on and on. i just really care about you and what happens to you, and i feel like i have and still do suffer from the same feelings. you are a caring, articulate, and loveable person, and you deserve the same care that you would give to your friends. i don't doubt at all that you would drop what you're doing to be there for a friend in need. maybe it's time to challenge your friends to do the same.
thinking of you and sending hugs,
cb
poster:CareBear04
thread:443169
URL: http://www.dr-bob.org/babble/psycho/20050117/msgs/444724.html