Anxiety/Depression/Mental Illness Support

[Shell B]

You don't have to go to your parents. There are resources for kids your age in many places. If you give me a country, I might be able to look some resources up for you. For now, call an anonymous hotline. They should be able to give you resources. You can also talk to a school counselor. You can even tell them your concerns about your parents. Another alternative is to say you do not want drugs, but therapy. They may be more understanding. Of course, your judgment is best in this situation, but I can guarantee there is some help. At least enough to get you through and out of high school. Then, you can make your own decisions.

[Cosmic Ape]

I've taken everything into account from my past years, and the experience I'm having at the moment, and I've concluded that I could be Depressed. For the past 2 years (or more) I've been apathetic towards life. I have constantly been contemplating suicide, going over how and when I'm going to commit suicide, and when my carelessness for life is going to push over the edge and actually commit suicide. This feeling hasn't taken affect to my grades at the moment, I'm still maintaining all A's as a 9th grader (I'm 15) in Highschool, but I still have bouts of apathy towards my grades because I plan on ending it soon. I've been aloof to everything around me, and I have lost interest in everything, and I can't seem to fathom why I've lost interest in life. I think I've been experiencing insomnia, I've constantly woken up during the middle of the night, in which, last Sunday night, I went to bed at 10:00 PM for school the next day, and I woke up at 2:37 and stayed up the whole night, in a depressive manner contemplating yet again: suicide. I'm socially averse, I try my best to avoid social interaction with others, mostly because I don't feel comfortable socializing with anybody except certain friends. I'm fatigued most of the day, and I dread waking up from my sleep. I'd rather be dreaming, where my unhappiness in reality is diminished, and I'm in a euphoric mood with no stress at all. I feel ineffectual in life, I have yet to decipher any purpose in existence. My mood swings from feeling down to feeling euphoric and full of energy, only on certain occasions, in which, it is mostly a despondent feeling every day. I constantly wait for the day that I'm happy, which has yet to happen for a long time. Like a vexatious feeling when you've been deprived of sleep. This feeling has been in place for a few years, and has had an effect on my mental health and sanity, along with my social relationships. I try my best to hide it, and I've concealed my suicidal intentions from my parents. The only reasons I conceal my intentions is so I can actually commit my suicide, without any conjecture from my parents. At the moment, I don't even know if I suffer from Depression, because I'm not going to the doctor, and definitely NOT my parents. Since some members on this forum have experienced Depression, I would really like to know if these are symptoms of Depression.

Cheers!

I can relate a lot to what you're going through and I commend you right off the bat for recognizing you're an Atheist first of all because I had an identity issue growing up not knowing what an atheist even was I thought I was just the only rational person on the planet when I was your age, Atheism is so negative to people that it never got brought up and I didn't care enough about my beliefs to really care, just thought it was complete utter shit with no evidence (which hasnt changed). Like you, I grew up depressed, left out, socially anxious, unloved, and yes at times suicidal, even tried to MAKE people feel sympathy for me because I felt they didnt care if I was dead and thought the was world was apathetic towards me, that no matter what, I was running uphill (that hasnt changed either). And I'll be honest with you, suicide is a pretty natural feeling among most people, not that you should necessarily be thinking about it per say but its natural to think about death when you are sad or are reminded of it or thinking of a hopeless situation etc. By the tone in your text you sound like a depressed person but you dont need to be diagnosed for that, anyone can get depressed about anything.

I wouldnt say you are disinterested in life completely or you wouldnt have come here to talk with us, which I'm glad you did. You went out of your way to find like-minded people to lift yourself up above whatever situations you may be in, so we can try our best to work you through it and problem solve the best we can with love and understanding. But probably the most relevant part of your speech was the part about you being lathargic in general and preferring to be asleep to being awake because I once contemplated an opiate-type death anf even wanting to be in a coma. But I realized that so matter how mad and depressed I got, no matter how much I wanted everyone in the world to see my view, even if it meant by force, that my presence on the Earth does matter, positively or negatively, its just harder to impact in a positive way for all life.

Each person has the power to do a lot of things and anyone who tells you differently is trying to bring you down and hinder your dreams, fuck em, the best people in history went against the grain of the times to come up with the next best inventions, innovations and ideas. You absolutely are important in that you are a long chain of life that took billions of years to evolve and it would be a shame to just end your life because you cant find your quote on quote purpose, a big reality check you are going to learn is that the universe doesnt owe you a purpose, and there is a bit of religious undertones in your voice, I still do that a little bit too from the minor damages religion did to me as a kid but purpose is just a concept people put on a thing, if you want purpose you can have it and if you dont want it, you dont need it.

If I had to put a "purpose" on my life it would be just being alive, getting educated, educating others, trying to progress our evolution and reproducing to expand that chain of life, thats the only true purpose of my life or yours, to evolve as fast as we can and make it as easy for our kids to live longer and prosper etc until we are a self-sustainable society and further. If you want real purpose, you should look into Transhumanism, I promise it will arise your inner need for this idea of purpose or I dont know if anything else will. Anyway, yes I think you are depressed but thats not something you need necessarily need medication for, I was depressed for years (and to some extent still am and probably always will) but those bullshit pills from the doctor gave me more side effects than results and coming off of the drug was a nightmare, i had the shakes and i vomited for 3 days straight after going cold turkey from anti-depressant bullshit.

The best thing to do is really find out who you are and what you like, this is only possible through maturing through growing up, you display a lot of symptoms I had and maybe youre the kind of person that should be on medication if you are seriously going to kill yourself at such a young age but I urge you to really think about who youre going to hurt, you may say youre parents dont care or friends dont care but you should care about you more than they care about you. You have your whole life ahead of you to find a great girl who loves you for who you are, and friends who really understand you, I doubt you know any atheists at school, and guess what? neither did I and it was painful until I met like-minded people who didnt believe in such moronic hogwash. Trust me, being an adult changes everything, the lack of freedoms you have as a kid can be depressing but the rewards of being a loving educated sentient being is worth being alive tenfold over death.

Best wishes, Hitchslap (mike)

[MilesTailsPrower]

Each person has the power to do a lot of things and anyone who tells you differently is trying to bring you down and hinder your dreams, fuck em, the best people in history went against the grain of the times to come up with the next best inventions, innovations and ideas.

I can shake it off if people try to bring me down. Apparently I wouldn't be a good doctor if I was an Atheist, because I would disrespect their religious boundaries. I don't honestly see how my mom rationalized that in her head, but it happened. Logical reasoning and rationalizing is definitely not her best asset.

You absolutely are important in that you are a long chain of life that took billions of years to evolve and it would be a shame to just end your life because you cant find your quote on quote purpose, a big reality check you are going to learn is that the universe doesnt owe you a purpose, and there is a bit of religious undertones in your voice, I still do that a little bit too from the minor damages religion did to me as a kid but purpose is just a concept people put on a thing, if you want purpose you can have it and if you dont want it, you dont need it.

Sorry about the religious undertones, it's my terminology that didn't provide what I really meant in that sentence. I'm just unable to grasp what it is that I would be good at, and enjoy when I actually grow up and go to college. All I'm looking for is something that is beneficial, and can proffer happiness, unlike the way I'm living right now. Innately, I'm just looking for "change".

If you want real purpose, you should look into Transhumanism, I promise it will arise your inner need for this idea of purpose or I dont know if anything else will.

I'll be sure to take a look into that.

Anyway, yes I think you are depressed but thats not something you need necessarily need medication for, I was depressed for years (and to some extent still am and probably always will) but those bullshit pills from the doctor gave me more side effects than results and coming off of the drug was a nightmare, i had the shakes and i vomited for 3 days straight after going cold turkey from anti-depressant bullshit.

Could you please list some of the possible side effects, for future reference?

The best thing to do is really find out who you are and what you like, this is only possible through maturing through growing up

That was what I meant, about deciphering my purpose in life. What I like, and who I am.



Thank you for the response Hitchslap, and Shell B.

[Cosmic Ape]

I can shake it off if people try to bring me down. Apparently I wouldn't be a good doctor if I was an Atheist, because I would disrespect their religious boundaries. I don't honestly see how my mom rationalized that in her head, but it happened. Logical reasoning and rationalizing is definitely not her best asset.

Yeah that's asinine for her to postulate that, if anything as an Atheist doctor you would value life more than a creationist doctor because as an Atheist you would know that death is final and that you have to do all you can for the patient and on the flipside the creationist can detatch himself from reality and say "well he's off to a better place" or some other anecdote and that takes away from actual morality and dehumanizes us in the worst possible way. I cant imagine how much it hurts for your own mother to tell you that you cannot be a moral and good person without religion when you could simply point out that other animals feel very deep emotions and sentiments like we do. Feelings of empathy, remorse, love, bonding, burying/mourning the dead, these are inate in us and if your mother isnt willing to learn that if you show her than thats a sad state of affairs.

Sorry about the religious undertones, it's my terminology that didn't provide what I really meant in that sentence. I'm just unable to grasp what it is that I would be good at, and enjoy when I actually grow up and go to college. All I'm looking for is something that is beneficial, and can proffer happiness, unlike the way I'm living right now. Innately, I'm just looking for "change".

Oh definitely no need to be sorry man, it happens to the most atheistic of us, and its proof by how many people say things like "godamnit" or "jesus christ" when mad. Or how I used to say "hey dont jinx it" when all I was really doing was promoting superstition which directly feeds into religion in my opinion. It feeds that mindset of false logic.

Could you please list some of the possible side effects, for future reference?

Sure. I'll give side effects for the withdrawal only since I feel that Anti-Depressants didnt do anything positive or negatively for me while on it. The first one I noticed was the shakes, my body would randomly seize up and even on occassion I would have headrushes and have to drop to my knees because my neurons werent firing properly from the lack of the drug. The second thing I noticed was that I was starting to get manic, something that never happened before or after I took the drug. My depression was a distinct feeling of sadness not a manic state where I couldnt control my thoughts or mood swings. And the third thing I noticed was that I was getting random symptoms of sickness, like vomiting, dizziness and irratability. These effects lasted for about 2 weeks before subsiding. But withdrawal can be avoided if you come down from the drug gradually.

Anyway, I'm glad you responded and keep us up to date, miles.

[searchingforanswers]

Haven't been on the forum in a while. This would be ny first thread to comment in. Anyway ive been having a LOT of anxiety attacks about death lately. Like i'll just be sitting in class or driving and for some reason think about death and get all sweaty and scared. Idk now thhat i really don believe in any sort of god anymore the idea of eternal nothingness has really started scaring me. Never really did before. To think i could die at any time and miss so much stuff and leave so many people is distracting me from everything lately. Anyone else have this problem?

[KichigaiNeko]

Yes...can be quite crippling. Have you sought any medical assistance??

Are you taking any medication??
(I ask as I have, over the past year, been taking Corticosteroids for asthma and this seems to be one of the side affects. About to go to my own doctor about it)

[searchingforanswers]

No not taken any meds and i don't think i want to start either.

[walknh2o]

Cognitive behavioral therapy is extremely useful. They use it for PTSD and OCD as well, which are very persistent types of anxiety. I'm glad it worked for you.

I never really had social anxiety, though it runs in my family (I don't care what anyone says. That shit is genetic.). I had a sort of existential anxiety, I suppose. I just assumed I was a worthless piece of shit, so I would be nervous about doing anything. It still happens. I mostly freak out about freaking out. In other words, I'm afraid I'll have an anxiety attack or heart problems (which produce uncomfortable symptoms for me) and ruin everyone else's time or put someone else in danger, such as when I am driving, then I have a fucking anxiety attack. If I don't think about it, I'm fine . . . most of the time.

I graduated from Cognitive behavioral therapy 5 months ago and yes it is extremely useful for PTSD remedies. I'm not thinking suicides anymore and the lessons learned from cognitive theraphy enables me to do workouts and meditation.I also can managed my "anger" and "addiction" much,much better.Pretty soon "war memories" will be history forgotten and deleted from inside my brain.

[MilesTailsPrower]

Oh definitely no need to be sorry man, it happens to the most atheistic of us, and its proof by how many people say things like "godamnit" or "jesus christ" when mad. Or how I used to say "hey dont jinx it" when all I was really doing was promoting superstition which directly feeds into religion in my opinion. It feeds that mindset of false logic.

I usually say "Goddammit" and "oh my god" when something happens to be unbelievable.

What gets me the most is that I've had depressive episodes for years and years, and I'm finally just realizing it. For the past 2 weeks my mindset has been off, and a few years before this I contemplated suicide. But this time the effects are much more conspicuous, then in past episodes. If I didn't have to deal with this, I would still be in my regular sports. I used to play Baseball, and I was on the wrestling team for 4 years, and at the start of this year I just couldn't handle it. But it is already too late to get back into any sport now that they have already started up, and if by chance, next year if I join any sport I'll end up getting my ass kicked because I didn't play them this year. But I'm still going to try and get some exercise in, and hopefully that will help with my depression. The only thing I'm proud of at the moment, are my grades, and I've been very lenient on those too. Anyways, thank you for the response.

Cheers!

[Jackalope]

I just wanted to check in - haven't been around much the last week or so. I really don't know how long it's been since I posted, but it was awhile before today I think. Probably a little over a week ago when my stepmom died. I'm doing OK I think, but I have been drinking quite a bit (and I usually don't drink much), and I went off my meds some time ago. I don't remember exactly when. Some time in early/mid December I think.

With my health problems and the death in the family, I guess I'm feeling a bit overwhelmed and have been checking out of life.