**Trigger Warning**

Hi. I used to be really mentally ill. I have had panic attacks, the worst case of obsessive compulsive disorder, bi-polar, anxiety and depression. I have struggled with substance abuse.  I have struggled with self-harm and suicide. One year I tried to kill myself multiple times. 

Treatment:

Coping- I have learned several coping skills. They really help.

Recovery- I was inpatient at a mental hospital. It really helped.

Therapy- I usually see my therapist every other week. It really helps.

Medication- My medication really helps too.

I hate the stigma!

Panic attacks, anxiety, depression and self harm. I let those define me over a year ago. That was my reality, and it still is, but this time I am defining myself trough the experiences that I have acquired trough getting healthy. 

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Hi, my name is Jack and I stumbled upon this forum while looking for info on different types of personality disorders. I was diagnosed with depression and anxiety at age 15 and started therapy and medications at that time. I could go through my past and talk about substance abuse (mainly alcohol) and periods of severe depression/anxiety, including full blown panic attacks and attempted suicide, if anyone wants to discuss that bc they can relate, but I’m really interested in talking about what is going on in my life now. I work in finance for a Fortune 500 company (only stating this to argue against the stigma of the type of people with mental health issues) and I struggle almost every day with dissociative disorder, more specifically Depersonalization Disorder. I have not been formally diagnosed but I have all the signs. The onset of an episode is completely random but when it occurs I feel like I’m watching a situation from the outside, almost like a movie.

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Navigating a world that often feels cold, insensitive, and unaccepting of mental illness is lifelong work, a healing journey with ups and downs that has no end. As a highly sensitive person who has lived with anxiety/depression/OCD/ADHD since childhood, struggled with self-harm, substance abuse, and eating disorders, and is a rape and domestic abuse survivor, I have sought out many forms of therapy over my lifetime, both traditional and alternative.

One concept that I became familiar with in Dialectal Behavioral Therapy (DBT) is having a toolbox. Every individual’s toolbox looks different and will evolve over time. It is essentially a list of our skills and techniques for emotional regulation, distress tolerance, mindfulness, and interpersonal effectiveness. I would like to share some of my go-to tools for self-soothing and traversing times of heightened anxiety/the unknown: 

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I am sick and tired of living with anxiety, social anxiety, dissociation, addiction, self harm, wondering if I’m going to snap out of a bad episode this time around. I have exhausted my options, even the ones that I  they could help couldn’t because of abuse my whole childhood I have no true potential in my heart. I do not understand life like they do I want to then I got in domestic violence years ago triggered it even more and recently all the trauma from childhood surfaces. Physical, emotional, sexual assault from 2 to 11 on one of my abuses the rest I just don’t remember ever knowing any better. I need to find my purpose and I mean fast I feel like I will stay disassociated and the rest half of my life doesn’t sound so fun for me disassociated. I break I mend  I break I realise I’m still broken. I don’t tell my story but I’m fed up with my secret life from hell. I don’t want to live in hell anymore. I don’t even think counseling is helping anymore. My kids lost their mom years ago, only one child can say they have their mom but not like my other children knew me before the darkness came. I’m a really good mom in darkness imagine how good I could be in the light, Every bit of purpose died out of my life without them and yet if you were to ask them they would say they have a perfect mom. I want to be a mom a grandparent a person that helps others just existence feels just like my life without hope.

*TRIGGER WARNING*

Hello, I am a 52 year old woman from the Midwest, I am bi-polar, I have PTSD, I suffer from depression, anxiety, panic attacks, and night terrors. I was abused as a young girl by a family friend that eventually became my brother-in-law, he sexually abused me for 3 years, my mom knew the whole time, She was actually being paid for my services i guess you could call it. She passed away when i was in my twenties i still have a love, hate for her. Your mom is supposed to be the one to do anything to protect you and make sure no harm comes to you. I feel like a lost and shameful child inside many days, i try to not think about it, but as with ptsd even these memories come back in very haunting ways.

Even as i sit here now i get panicky and have a cold sweat on my forehead. I know in my mind i am safe, its 41 years later, but its an uncontrollable reaction i have without even bringing up any details of the abuse. I do have flashbacks and panic attacks from this horrific event. I just today told my therapist about something he made me do that i had never told anyone. He made me swallow a bullet, I can still taste the metal in my mouth, at times i swear i feel the heaviness of that bullet in my stomach. I am so paranoid of the darkness and of even going outside after dark that it sometimes paralyzes me. I often wake up either screaming, or flying from the bed to hide in my closet. I am so embarrassed about my fear, that I just barely ever leave my home.

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Hello.  My name is Jeff.  I’ve been coping with moderdate depression, general anxiety, issues around self-harm, and trauma issues since I was a teenager.  Around age 16 I turned to music and started playing guitar to give me a sense of worth, and accomplishment.  Iplayed a lot of metallica and megadeth when I first started playing.  I ended up at Berklee College of music.  While I was there I made a number of close friends, that I am still in contact with.  I however also began drinking quite a bit.  I wouldn’t drink every day, but when I did I would get totally obliterated.  I was mostly ro compe with anxiety, and to express things I had kept to myself for years out of anxiety.  Ultimately I came to the point where I was drinking alone.  By the time I finfished music school I was self-harming.  The first time or so it was about self punnishment, but before too long I realized that because of the endorphines I would feel ok for about a half hour after. 

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My name is Athena. I’m **-years-old. I was diagnosed with PTSD two years ago and anxiety with depressive episodes. I have struggled with this since I was about 11-years-old. I am healing.

The first time I ever felt bad about myself was when I got excited about a movie as a kid and my dad told me “no one cares.”

I experienced verbal abuse from him that led to self harm. He would always say he was “joking.” One time at a lake when I was 5, my dad threw me in and laughed as I couldn’t breathe in the water. My mom ran down and pulled me out while I cried my eyes out. He said it was supposed to be “fun.”

An F on a math test? My dad almost punched me in the face but held back when I was 12.

Me walking in on him cheating on his girlfriend (after my parents divorced?) He threatened to light my drawings on fire.

Every time I talked about an accomplishment, it was time to move onto him. He never gave me praise - but showed me off to his friends because of my intelligence.

When I became an adult, I had a tendency to attract men similar to him. So much so, I was raped two years ago. I joined the same club as my mom - from when she would tell me later.

I’ve had men demand to see my phone, cheat on me without using protection, slap me, follow me on the street, grope me, assume I want to fuck them because I’m bisexual, and assault me.

I am afraid of men. But I don’t let it control me.

I am in therapy and after a few therapists - I found the right one. I think I’m making progress but recovery is NOT a straight line. Don’t believe the motivational speeches that “everything will go away.” It doesn’t but therapy teaches you how to manage and not let it consume you.

Currently, I’ve been a relationship for 2 years with a man who has been very supportive. He struggles - he has ADHD and depression along with a history of drug abuse. I’ve seen him not be able to get out of bed but I help him as he’s helped in in a healthy manner.

My best advice is fine those you can trust. From friends, colleagues, family - ANYONE. It’s not easy in the slightest but sometimes you can’t do it alone. But once it’s out of you, it feels SO good. Asking even the question, “I’m going through a lot right now, can I talk to you about it?”

There are state resources, insurance, Medicaid - there are options out there that DO help! Try different therapists, different techniques, etc. But you HAVE to keep fighting. Not everyone works the same way. Sometimes medication doesn’t work for some. Sometimes it’s the only thing that helps.

But you have to keep going…And there are some who still don’t make it. It’s a fact some people have to accept. But YOU are in control.

This drove me to start working in health insurance so I could help those who were struggling in American healthcare and truly make a difference.

To depart with a quote from Anne Sexton (who committed suicide when she was 46 and was a very famous poet when she was alive:)

“Put your ear down close to your soul and listen hard.”

I’ve struggled with anxiety and depression for most of my life. I drank in excessive amounts in High School and cut myself often. I’d lay on the floor crying for hours about well many things…. I never imagined a life beyond the walls of my room in that house. I deeply hated myself and whenever something went wrong it would replay in my head like a broken record. I had nervous ticks i constantly did. I went to a college far from home hoping it would free me from the confines of my overbearing parents who often claimed I had been exaggerating or that depression was fake. I had been cutting. I often thought about suicide. I’d lock myself in a closet to keep myself from looking out a window since I lived on the 4th floor. I had been cutting deeply into my arms and was crashing hard. I went to the doctor for god knows what reason and a doctor had seen my cuts while taking my BP. 

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