And joining this site is part of it. I want to live, and live happily, even.
Sometimes that resolution seems easy; most days it's a rough hike towards the night, when I can finally take medicines to fall asleep.
I am amess with supportive parents, siblings, a boyfriend, a therapist. But they cannot understand what it is like to live out my day, wishing I were unconscious. None of us understand why I cannot get better.
So I am glad to be joining everyone here. Browsing the forums, I already feel a little less alone.
I like that you don't say the simple act of talking makes you feel better - because it does not always. You add that it may make other people understand you better, which is a definite benefit.
I really, really dislike it when people encourage me to "talk about it" or "talk it out", and then feel shocked or surprised that I don't feel better afterwards. It's like the talk show culture/confessional culture gone haywire. Some are surprised that talking/listening aren't solutions in themselves!
I'd like to hear more activities that aren't necessarily dependent on the "success" or "failure".
I like sewing, but it sometimes brings on bouts of negativity. At first it helped me build a tougher skin - small mistakes can be resewn or cut out; but major mistakes, especially after a difficult afternoon, really puts me down. It helps that now I make my goals to be "work on a sewing project for x hours" instead of "get to this step of a project".
It's the confessional, talk-show culture thing. Talking with someone who knows about the ways we distort things negatively, though... it can be really, really helpful. Especially if he/she isn't afraid to come right out and say, Yeah, now *that*'s a bad situation and you're right in this case. (But also knows when to say - you're overgeneralizing, etc. etc.)
Thanks for the welcome. As someone who has always overachieved, realizing that just *living* is an achievement is encouraging - because as long as I live another year, I have the opportunity to change.
For me, I haven't found a way to journal... in a useful way. They are records of my worst periods, and are frankly monotonous. At worst, I find myself romanticizing about self-harm; at best they are a record of the various medicines/psychiatrists/therapists that did not work out.
Can someone give me a starting point for a journal that might be useful, somehow? Some way to write with hope in mind? Are these even the right questions to ask?
(The mood tracker and activity tracker are great because they'll eventually show me patterns in my moods - so I don't want to include that in my journal. I have my mini goals and to-do lists...)
Thanks wildcat. I wish I could find something to get excited about like that.
I was also just reading the "journaling" post written by one of the mods - "use it as a jumping off point for positive things...?" (I'm paraphrasing, or totally misunderstanding.) "Find a hero or artwork that inspires you..."
Is it in one of our exercises that I haven't reached yet?
Perhaps I need some positive mindframe to start off with to write that kind of journal? I've stopped journaling because each entry would just devolve into list-making for suicidal fantasies, and that's not helpful at all.
Or are there other questions I can ask myself? Would it be harmful to just start writing some escapist fantasy, Harry Potter-style?
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