man who needs therapy discovers he may need therapy
Then discovers he can’t afford therapy
just so you know, it’s a lot more affordable than you might think, and many therapists offer reduced rates for people on low incomes
The best therapy is to just go in the forest and fight a bear. It’ll put some hair on your chest and it’ll put things in perspective.
I doubt fighting a bear would have helped me overcome my trauma from being abused as a kid tbh
I’m sorry that happened to you and I’m glad you found the support and care that you needed now please go fight a bear.
I don’t know. Ever win a fight? I felt like the gorilla god king of the block for like a week after beating up someone who attacked me. It was better then cocaine
you can do both
A partner won’t fix you, or at least you shouldn’t expect them to. A partner is there to support you in good times and bad. A crutch to lean on when you need it. Someone to comfort you when you need it. They aren’t some magic tool to correct issues you might have.
However partner can be a driving force for you to start fighting for yourself - an external motivation. And partner can offer a boost to perceived self worth. Enough to enable you to try to fight for yourself.
Trying doing some ecstasy/mushrooms/LSD
(It won’t necessarily fix you not having a gf, just to be clear)
It also won’t fix the problem, and also make you realize that you’ve never felt true happiness before in your life. And then you further realize that you never will feel that way again without drugs. (Remember that the first time is always the strongest!)
It also won’t fix the problem
It most definitely can. While obviously recreational use is a bit different than having MDMA/psilocybin/LSD-therapy (or ketamine, which is slightly more acceptable for some reason, but works in a different fashion psychoactively so not relevant here).
And then you further realize that you never will feel that way again without drugs.
Lol any other drug propaganda you heard in preschool you wish to share? I’ve done every single drug you can think of, never addicted to anything except maybe weed a bit (and when I was younger also cigarettes and caffeine), and I’ve never felt anything even close as powerful as when you properly get infatuated. Because that is honestly a very strong cocktail of hormones and the difference between hormones and neurotransmitters is quite small, some acting as both.
Remember that the first time is always the strongest!)
Also incorrect. Was you first time tasting coffee the strongest caffeine rush you’ve had, or was it a bit later when you’d got used to it and could binge? Same with alcohol. Except that with serotonergic substances, you don’t do that.
One single use can alleviate severely depression on terminally ill patients for months. Literally. That’s not those people being high or having some false sense of happiness.
If you want me to get more objective about how it works and why I suggest it to OP, then here. Think of your emotional memory being associative memory, like smells are. You can probably remember what your first gf/bf smelled like, at least vaguely, but if you actually had the taste in front of your nose, it would unlock just tons of visceral memories. Now you had those memories even before having the scent in your nose, but they were sort of “locked” behind the associated trigger. It’s not about what is a trigger and what is not, but the general associative nature of it. When you do a serotonergic substance for a sufficient dose, it floods your head with all sorts of those triggers, but the ones that have to do with serotonin, ie good feelings of unity etc orrr on the flipside high anxiety (that’s why MDMA with a therapist is preferred to shrooms by yourself, so it actually goes the pleasant route and you don’t get a serotonin induced panic response, ie a “bad trip”). And since your brain is flooded, it also unlocks a lot of memories of happy times and contentedness, which in depression just sort of “fade away” because you haven’t felt them in a long time and depression is a feedback loop.
Thats why you need a powerful substance to break the loop.
So unlike psychiatrist have been pushing for like 30 years, serotonin reuptake inhibitors (prozac, cipralex, escitalopram, etc) don’t actually function well, despite there being a little bit of an idea behind it (as in a correctly identified system, serotonin). The problem is that low dose over a long time won’t help, high dose over a short time will. Kinda like setting something on fire. A slightly warm electric battery won’t help no matter how long you keep dry grass on it.
Shit analogy at the end but the theories hold true.
I can find more detailed sources but I’m kinda tired and wrote all that already so leave your questions/doubts under this akd I’ll adress them tomorrow if you can’t find it on this basic wiki which I didn’t read currently I’ve just read a lot over the years and can’t be arsed to try and look for specific references rn
I should mention that I speak from experience. I am not anti-drug, quite the opposite in fact. I’m just realistic about it, so the novel was completely unnecessary. I have ADHD so I’m not going to read all of that anyway. You just wasted your time thanks to some assumptions you made about me.
Be sad together
Lmao same 🤣🤣🤣
Yeah I’m not sure what to tell yall, but happiness comes from within. If you attach it to mental formations (i.e. “The only way I can be happy is with a boyfriend/girlfriend”), then you’re gonna have a bad time.
Happiness and unhappiness come from both internal and external sources. The problem is making yourself RELIANT on the external.
happiness comes from within
In my experience, having a constant companion has a positive feedback loop. People you can continuously interact with - joking, catching up, eating together, helping one another out, just Netflix’n’Chilling… it’s reaffirming.
But it is a loop. You don’t just wake up happy forever. There’s ups and downs. There’s psychical and emotional adjustments. You’re not immune to despair. You just have someone you can be glum around who - ideally - fills you in on the lows and rides with you for the highs.
If you’ve got a bunch of mental baggage going into a relationship, your partner (ideally) helps you unpack that shit and dispose of it. Or, at least, shows you their own baggage, so you know you’re not alone. It doesn’t just go away instantly, but over time you can put it behind you precisely because you’ve got someone else in your life affirming your own worth.
Idk, I’ve never been happier than the six months I was dating this girl who’s sex drive was almost as high as mine. Never been able to get there on my own and the other aspects of my life have been way better since then. Sadly her mental health was a mess and that relationship didn’t last.
I mean that’s not actual loneliness then? You can be depressed without feeling lonely I think?
Congratulations on correctly reading the post.
Anon has threat-sensitive anxiety.
The message is an unexpected intrusion, with right answers and wrong answers but it’s not clear which is which. “Morning beautiful! 😍 💕” Is insincere because anon doesnt feel that cheerful, and anon lacks confidence in his ability to be convincingly insincere, as well as feeling like a fraud for having to pretend to be happy, AND is acutely reminded of his inability to be happy. “Morning” is muted and emotionless, bound to be inadequate, possibly signalling anger or discontent. "👍 " Is definitely a no-go, probably. Non-response is also just kicking the can down the road, eventually he has to respond, AND come up with an excuse why he took so long.
Anon has just woken up and immediately needs to deal with a scenario that his threat-model doesn’t cover, and where a wrong answer will have real-world consequences, possibly derailing his whole day and impacting his relationship over the longer term.
Anon is exhausted from the constant wargaming with all the minutiae of life.
I’m saving this for when someone sends me a friendly message and I don’t know how to respond. It will probably derail my relationship, but at least they know what happened.
It could also just be good ol dysthymia. That’s what I have and I feel OPs mood.
Fake: anon got a gf
Gay: anon is broken and lonely because he doesn’t have a bfJoking aside, a lot of these feelings come from childhood problems, whether we understand the triggers or not. It sucks because stuff that happens then carries over for the rest of our lives and it gets progressively harder to fix the older you get. People like this are the symptoms of a not quite functional family. Such families are the symptom of a broken, diseased society.
Dude needs therapy.
He’s a nut! Crazy in the coconut!
What does that mean?
He was white as a sheet, and he also made false teeth
Depression a motherfucker
Truly. Hopefully this post judges people towards treatment; people want you, they want you to be better, they want to share their love with you.
Me: terminally paranoid
Uhhhhhh, people want to share their love with me??? No. That sounds suspicious as hell. It’s a trap. What’s their endgame? I know they aren’t after me lucky charms, because that cereal is disgusting, so I never buy it.
Still…these “people” sound demented in the head.
I have a friend who is depressed but I sadly feel like I can’t say or do anything to help, even his meds don’t seem to help much
As someone who has treatment-resistant depression: keep inviting your friend. Keep asking them for help when it makes sense to do so. Even if they cancel a lot or are quiet when they do show up. That’s helping a lot.
People need community.
I was very depressed and traumatized when I met my boyfriend. He helped me through so much shit. We took the sickness part of in sickness and health first. Honestly, I sometimes wonder how fucking weird we are, because the first 4ish years of our relationship was on hard mode. I don’t understand how I managed to meet the one man on the planet who’d willingly go into a relationship with a suicidal person and be like: yeah. This will be worth it.
But yeah, things improved. And they got better. And they kept getting better. Around the ten year mark covid hit and we were stuck in lockdown. That became the fertile ground for the honeymoon phase we never got to have in the first couple of years of our relationship. It lasted three years. Just nonstop romance and then we calmed down a bit, but things didn’t go back to what they had been. We had permanently leveled up and I think this is how it should have felt like all this time. Granted, life is still hard and there are still ups and downs, but it feels so much better now. Im grateful that we got to have the honeymoon phase. I always wanted to have that with him because he’s such a wonderful person.
I know that depression is differnet for everybody, but I do hope that someone like Anon gets to experience what I have experienced.
Alright, stop showing off. Crikey!!
On a more serious note, nice one.
In my twenties and very early thirties I was convinced (and planned) to be dead by 40. I figured what’s the point of getting old etc AND being depressed etc etc.
Then I met my now wife and everything changed. She didn’t know the true extent of how bad I was, and mostly still doesn’t. No one does because I was a master at hiding it.
To everyone else I was the life of the party, the comic who made everyone laugh etc etc.I still have my ups and downs, but that’s life. I spend every day trying to make her life better, which doesn’t always happen. But, again, that’s life.
Have you ever considered opening up to her about it? I know it can be really scary, but you don’t have to be alone with those things. I still have things I struggle to open up to my boyfriend about, but we work on it and he’s also gotten better at opening up to me when he has things that weighs on him. It makes it easier to help each other getting through things if you know what the other is carrying around. And I know how hard it is for men especially to be vulnerable, but it might actually help you. And as a woman, I can tell you that it feels truly special when your man opens up to you about things that hurt. It only makes me love mine more whenever he leans on me for emotional support. Yesterday I listened to him for an hour talking about stresses at work and while he couldn’t tell me specifics due to a vow of silence, he still expressed how heavy it was for him and that, that’s why he’s been super tired lately. I could hear in his voice that it eased his heart a bit to be able to talk about it and know I was listening and there with him even if I didn’t know the specifics. It made me happy to know that he felt a bit better after that talk. Especially since he’s always there for me and always supporting me when I’m stumbling. He’s a very independent man and handles his own shit most of the time. Doesn’t want to burden me, but I want to be burdened. I want to know what he struggles with so he doesn’t have to be alone.
I dunno, I think that your wife may really appreciate to know how you feel so she can be there for you when you need her 🤗 it might also be a relief for you to know that you don’t have to carry all that by yourself.
She knows I wasn’t expecting to live past 40 because at the time that we met I had no pension or plans for old age. I figured what’s the point in doing that if I’m not going to be around.
What no one knows is the stupid and reckless things I did, basically I was trying to off myself but make it look like an accident.We are each other’s rocks though. If I have a bad time then I’ll go to her and explain, but I prefer to be her rock. It drives me to be there for her, and certain others. She deserves to have the best and most happy life, and that’s my job to provide it. Yet she knows that I’ll go to her if necessary.
The key to happiness is having zero expectations. Seeking it in others is probably one of the worst places to look.
The key to happiness is having zero expectations.
anon rediscovers stoicism
anon rediscovers stoicism
Don’t slap a western coat of paint onto older teachings.
One has the right to perform their expected duty,
But not to the right to the fruits of action;
One should not consider oneself as the doer of the action,
Nor should one attach oneself to inaction.- Bhagavad Gita 2 : 47
According to Wikipedia, the bhagavad gita was written around 200 BC, whereas stoicism originated in 400 BC. Admittedly, this was just the result of some very cursory research, the Buddhist philosophy could go back further than the writing itself, but it seems to me like they independently arise around the same time (that being around 200 years difference, lol) but you really need to be careful saying stuff like that. I’ve made the same mistake dozens of times where I confidently state something, only for it to be disproven by a minute of googling.
The Bhagavad Gita is a synthesis work of even older teachings going back a thousand years before it was written in that book.
The key to happiness is having zero expectations.
I disagree. Zero expectations leads to rotting if you’re down already. As I understand it, zero expectations almost equals zero trust.
Zero expectations leads to rotting if you’re down already.
“Expectations” are different from “goals”. One of the easiest paths to chronic unhappiness is to treat happiness as an expectation.
Happiness is fundamentally transitory and unsuitable for a goal, although setting up the circumstances for it to occur regularly isn’t a bad idea. Being at peace, satisfied, not bored, and others relevant to you are much more consistent and achievable, and you only need to rely on yourself to do so (happiness is often circumstantial).
Happiness is fundamentally transitory and unsuitable for a goal
Oh, yeah, sorry, I didn’t mean to imply “don’t treat happiness as an expectation; treat it as a goal!”, because like you said, it’s fundamentally incompatible with what a goal is. I like to consider the SMART criteria, and even though it fails all of them (except ‘T’ if you insist you have a deadline to be happy), it fails ‘A’ the hardest, because a goal as such is literally defined by how it’s oriented toward taking an action. Even if you think your goal is “I will be happy by doing X today”, then – as long as you think you can do X and have a plan – what you actually have is the goal “I will do X today” with the faulty, tacked-on expectation of “and that will make me feel happy”.
Call me pedantic, but that’s not zero expectations. I 100% agree on the happiness expectations to depression pipeline, but zero expectations to me is expecting a ROI of 0, that is expecting any effort to be wasteful.
expectations / reality
Lonliness is a significant driver of depression in modern society. Finding community and relationships can absolutely help. In fact friends and partners are generally the first people we need to talk to about our feelings.
Honestly, having good friends is super important, especially friends that you can have fun with on a compatible level. I have had over half a decade with no friends that I could do anything fun with, More like situationfriendships. Luckily I now have a friend that I can have consistent fun with, and we both have never felt better. Fun is so important in life, especially with other people.
Its rare to find a friend who will try new things. Super great to just say, “lets do this thing!” and them to emphatically agree 😁 I used to have no choice but to do those things alone.
So, how do I find them? I’m not in school and it’s not like I live in a capital city. I also want to keep my privacy so online services asking for pictures and full names is a no go too. Finding friends online is hard too, since I don’t use discord or the other mainstream apps. Not to mention my social and general anxiety.
I guess how I found my friend was really complicated and a bit of an adventure. But what I would do was go to a local casual sporting event (street dodgeball) in my city, albeit sketchy but cool. Didn’t even have to talk. I also had really bad social anxiety. Being able to talk to homeless people on a regular basis for me made it a lot easier to talk to people who make 6 figures.
I would say if you can find a card/tabletop game shop that you can hangout there for free would be a good place. In a place like that, a lot of people are in the same boat. Pushing through the entry barrier is the hardest part, and it does not always work out. But when it does work, then you can carry on from there. Also see if the shop has some events you can attend. (I’m also a paranoid person, to the point that I think the store music is trying to get me)
Maybe also look for local sporting events. It doesn’t even have to be super intense or clean or dirty.
What helped my social anxiety is my friend said that muggers look for people who don’t look people in the eye or have confidence or smile. So, when I walk by people, I look them in the eye and smile. So now instead of feeling powerless and a social outcast, now I get to see them as wrong and muggable. You will have to power through it first. And then you will eventually get a person smiling back, or even starting a conversation. You’ll be suprised how different other people are and how they think of the world.
Anyway, thank you for coming to my TedEx Talk!
The key to happiness is having zero expectations.
Nope. Can’t agree with you. I don’t understand life, so I never know what to expect. Everyday I wake up and wonder what fresh new hell will await me in the headlines of the news, as the president continues to amaze me, and leave me in awe in all the new and creative ways he finds to globally embarass our whole country, and bring with it a new form of torture for all it’s citizens.
The REAL secret to happyness is to have your butthole licked while riding a jetski, and eating an ice cream sunday.
Dear, older people of Lemmy, does it ever get better?
Time heals all wounds. But you do have to stop picking at the scabs.
Get a gf. She says “good morning <3”. You feel like shit, so let her know. “<3 you too. Rough start. Hope your day is going better.” You might be surprised what you get back.
It’s funny, there was another thread a while back about a girl who meets a guy and clicks. They hook up. She keeps trying to be sweet to him and he ghosts her. So she goes into her own depressive spiral because she assumes she’s the one who isn’t enough.
Other people have shitty days too. Other people are going through what you’re going through. Other people will understand. Reach out, speak your truth, and if that chemistry you had at the beginning meant anything it’ll mean they’re sympathetic to your plight.
And then go do some fun shit together. FFS, it’s a nice time to be alive. Get some sun, eat some food, suck in some fresh air, and hold hands. See if that doesn’t put you in a better mood. Sometimes it really is just a bad start to a normal day.
I feel like I don’t have much to offer a woman. I’m in my mid twenties and I can’t drive a car, I have a crappy job, and I still live with my parents. I do want someone I can be honest and authentic with. I feel like what I can bring to a relationship isn’t enough though.
For me it did.
38 today, had depression since I was 8. Just last month we removed Massive Depressive, from my chart for the first time ever.
Lots of work. Removing people who are bad from me, adding in people who know how to love, and 6 years of weekly therapy. No meds for me, just introspection and… therapy.
Nope.
Nothing gets better until you make it better.
Nobody is coming to save you. You have to save yourself.
Many people spend their entire lives waiting to be saved. Just like they piss away their money gambling and drinking and wondering why they are poor, rather than saving their money and building a nest egg.
Stop waiting, start taking charge of your life.
It does. But you have to put in the work. You have to try.
28 year old here, depressed since 14, nearly kms at 18 and then stayed suicidal till 26.
It do get better. I got a job, bought a house, got a gf, started practicing hobbies, socializing more and working on self discipline (But not self degradation)
Now instead of being consistently 2-3/10 I’m about 5.5/10. Still not a full blown optimist but I don’t want to die anymore.
It does.
I’ve experienced symptoms of depression for as long as I can remember. Over the years I tried a lot of different treatments, medication, therapy, etc. None of it ever worked.
I lost a lot of jobs and friendships because I simply didn’t have the energy to do the bare minimum. I divorced the love of my life in part because I could see how much my chronic illness was weighing on them.
I was never suicidal but I’ve frequently wished I was because that at least would provide me with an option to stop the unending apathy.
There’s never going to be a point in my life when I’m not depressed. I’m gonna have to be very disciplined and work hard to maintain a level of functioning that I consider suboptimal. Mistakes made when trying to judge how much energy something will take or those unavoidable times where you simply need to push yourself more than is comfortable will be setback that could take days or weeks to recover from.
But I have reached a point in which I’m content a lot more. I have a partner that loves me and they’re great. I’m a more-or-less reliable member of a local anarchist collective and people appreciate me and come to me for advice. They’re respectful of my limitations. I’ve been reading more and trying new hobbies. There’s people who love me and I love them.
I can look at a sunset and appreciate its beauty. Yesterday I was singing along with some punk rock while driving and kinda enjoyed it. I baked cookies to share with people and I look forward to handing them out. I found an empty snail shell on the street and it was pretty enough to make me smile.
Is my life amazing? No. Do I have to work very hard and be very disciplined to achieve what most people seem to have naturally? Yes. Have I reached the point where I think that work and discipline is worth it more often than not? Definitely.
The best advice I can give you is to do things anyway. Seek out things that are, at least in theory, fun or enjoyable. If there’s something you’d like to try out but it feels scary or not worth doing, try do it anyway. Look for what makes it easier.
Imagine the coolest possible future version of yourself. Try to take small steps to move in that direction. For me that was things like painting my nails, going to Pride, joining a protested, learning to wield a sword… For my partner this was dying their hair, going out to party, learning to make fire… However it looks to you: try to do it.
First off, thank you. I appreciate you taking the time to respond. I have been reading more. I never touched a book after high school but recently went back to reading. I love horror and thriller novels. I never thought a book could be scarier than a video game.
Do I have to work very hard and be very disciplined to achieve what most people seem to have naturally? Yes.
This was always something I struggled with.
I sometimes wonder If I had everything I ever wanted would I actually be happy? It’s like Spock said “After a time, you may find that having is not so pleasing a thing after all as wanting. It is not logical, but is often true.” I think I’d still find something to be sad about.
Painting you nails is cool. I started doing that. I love the complements I’ve been getting. Making fire is fun too.
This was always something I struggled with.
It’s something I still struggle with. I’m getting better at accepting I’m tired almost all the time, but everything else I, much harder to accept.
I know fairness is irrelevant for this, but it just doesn’t feel right that I have carefully plan my most meaningful activies because I’ll be emotionless for two weeks if I do two protests in one week. Or that a date night could be ruined by an unexpected depressive period.
I sometimes wonder If I had everything I ever wanted would I actually be happy?
Happiness isn’t about having things, I think. Of course being in a situation in which you have your needs met helps. Financial security, a partner, housing, food, friends, etc. make it way easier.
But most of the moments in which I was “happiest” weren’t about “having” or the fulfilment of a specific desire. They were much more about experiencing community and feeling like I had agency.
It does. Unfortunately, it requires a great deal of honest introspection and tough decisions.
Middle aged here. It does not.
So… Depends. My whole life was just either being alone or in short relationships, one night stands and just fwb. I was quite happy with that, because i knew that i would lose interest almost immediately. I always felt bad for it, because it sucks, especially if the other person doesn’t feel that way. Thanks to tinder and other shitty dating apps, it wasn’t that big of a deal, because it’s easier to find someone and communicate expectations and so on. I was convinced that i’ll never have a “real” girlfriend. I was even convinced that love isn’t real. I have never told a girl or woman that i love them, i thought other people would just fake love, because they found someone they like and rather have that than being alone.
So now, almost 6 months ago, i met this woman on tinder. She wasn’t looking for anything serious, and neither was i. We hit it off immediately and we met up shortly after. I wasn’t sure if she liked me, but she was really nice and funny and just absolutely stunning, and way too smart for me. But we met again and again. When we met for the third time, we were in bed and we talked for hours, and i asked her if she knew that i loved her. And she said she loves me too. She told me how she was never truly happy with anyone, and was always rather alone. But she loves me, and always wants to spend time with me. And i feel the same way. She’s the first person i have ever met that i want to spend as much time with as i can. We plan on getting married, which if someone told me that 6 months ago, i would literally point and laugh at them for hours. The mere thought of getting married was bizarre to me, unthinkable. Only idiots do that. But here we are now.
Honestly? It depends. You can make it better, if you try or make it worse if you don’t. This sounds like they were not “lonely” that was just something they could blame it on.
Go do something. It doesn’t really matter what. Exercise, join a rpg group, join a maker space, move to a new city, change jobs, join a group about off roading. It doesn’t matter, learn to cook, learn to bake. Just do something.
Laying in bed or staring at a monitor/TV won’t help. Most people will get into a mental loop of how they are bad because they don’t have any real comparisons of real people. You may make mistakes but you will see other people make mistakes too.
Regarding relationships I love the quote from Jimmy Carr (yes he has dark humor and often is offensive) “don’t think what you can get, think what you can provide”.
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Too real…
