hello

welcome kelly, nice intro.

i want to enjoy my life and start working towards my goals

thanks moth for writing. this is a neat site. i have taken the wellbutrin for two days and i can not believe how great i feel. i wish everyone could take this stuff. i am going to write more about it in the meds section. not only does it work awesome for me, it has great side effects: loss of appetite, wieght loss, tons of energy and 3 times more likely to increase sexual appetite than decrease it. and it is generic! after HMO it is $5/month. yippee!

Why can I not be with my family for more than 5 mins?

somethings that helps me lot in this situation is a theraputic relationship. keep looking until you find a therapist that is empathetic to your pain. because my therapist is so good at this i have developed a great trust of him. just knowing that he will not judge me or trivalize my pain or compete with me lets me open up about my hurts. from your description it sounds like you are desperately seeking a theraputic relationship where the other person will acknowledge you pain, understand it, and tell you "wow, that sounds like it was really bad." unfortunately, you are trying to fill this within your family relationships and they do not have the knowledge, training, interest, or desire to be your therapist. so, very sadly, you are wounded again. you wouldnt go to the grocery store to buy construction materials for a home remodel. you would go the professionals who are ready, willing and able to serve your needs! the power of therapy is amazing. i will never forget one time when i was telling my therapist how bad my childhood was and he very sincerely said, "wow, that must have really hurt." i immediately started to squirm. i was suddenly very very uncomfortable. i felt the genuine-ness of his words and i wanted to push them right back at them. what the heck???? i checked deeply inside me, why was is blocking away the sympathy i so desperately wanted and needed? i figured out that i was afraid to allow myself to be weak enough to accept sympathy. if i accepted the sympathy then i would have to admit how very hurt i had been. i had survived my chilhood by being too strong to admit how bad it hurt. (i have found that it is often true that the adaptations that we developed to surivive our childhoods are the very behaviors and thought patterns that have block us from our healing.) it was weird as heck and a breakthrough moment for me. i internalized his sympathy right then and there and i was finally able to start healing the traumas of my past. my eyes are welling up as i type this. let me know how you are doing, moth, i am rooting for you!

wellbutrin - a personal testament

i have just started (day three) with 150 mg sustained release daily and i can not believe how happy i am and how much energy i have. i am cleaning around my house and it is easy, EASY! i cant believe it, what a huge difference. housework was so hard before, such a terrible struggle. also, i am participating in activities with my family, enjoying them and even initating them. i always declined before and struggled with how much i loved my family but how little i could tolerate them. tonite is new year's eve and i do not have custody of any of my three kids from two marriages, but i have been too depressed to want to do anything. nobody invited me to anything anyway. my only option is to go out to a bar or a dance but i know the chances are good that i will not have a good time and will be irritated by the vulgarity of the people around me. even worse, i would probably get loaded and then have to drive home. very, very risky. but i am on meds and cant drink so instead.... i have invited my three kids and two exes over to my house tonite for a shared dinner and watching of the televised celebration. can you believe this! i know my exes are absolutely stunned that i would invite them over, and with kids, on new years eve for a small family party. this is even different from what i would have done before i got depressed. back then i self-medicated with alcohol and took risks that punished myself and my family. my exes are used to me spending all of my non-custody time partying as much as i can as far away from my family as possible. oh, i also got the idea to use the time together to go through the boxes of pics in the garage. ex number two has been asking me to do this and it should be a great activity for the evening. oh, and encourage my daughter to play her clarinet for all of us. what a great idea! and this next part i found even more amazing. yesterday i sat down to do my bills and discovered i had charged $1400 during the previous month. yikes! i had no idea, i was expecting $600-800. obviously this was very bad news. BUT IT DIDNT BOTHER ME AT ALL. i just sat down and analyzed all my bills that would be coming in and figured out what was going to be left. after all my bills were paid i discovered i will have to survive on $15

new year

hear, hear! i second that intent!

New Year...New Thoughts

welcome snowshoe. i look forward to pontinificating with you....

unable to print session 2 materials directly

i was, however, able to save them to my computer then open that pdf file and print from there.