Mental Health

You know, if the ONSPM (Office for National Statistics Psychiatric Morbidity) stat is true, and 1 in 4 British adults do experience some form of mental health problem every year, then that means 15.24 million people currently suffer in this country alone from these problems.

Co-morbidity – that being the term given out to people with more than one mental disorder – is said to be much rarer, with about 12% of the affected population suffering from depression.

Now what I want to know is what peoples thoughts are on mental health problems. There is already a thread on depression in general in the Leisure Hive, but what I want to know, overall, is what the general opinion of the Tenth Planeters to the issue? There is more to mental health than depression: there is also anxiety, eating disorders, OCD, delirium, dementia, amnesia, mood disorders, schizophrenia, ICDs, sleep disorders, personality disorders, panic disorder, hypochondria, agrophobia, phobias in general, post-traumatic stress disorder, dissociative disorders, to name but a few.

And since it's unfair to ask of others what you would not ask of yourself, I will put my head on the block.

I was first diagnosed with a form of depression in 2002, when I was sixteen. Given that the diagnosis was after a lengthy low period culminated in a failed suicide attempt, it's fair to say it existed for a wee while before the definition. In fact, an attempt to chart back the feelings done by the psychiatrists in 2003 claimed I had been having depressive spells since I was at least five, and have continued to and will continue to have such spells for the rest of my life.

I was tried on various pills for it in the following years, finally deciding to go without in January 2008. The problem there is this: no form of mental health is a straight line, it is not the same from person to person. Every individual has a pattern/structure/setting/etc that uniquely defines them from the other. So the pills are like throwing a key at the door and hoping that will open it. For some they work, some pills have as high as a 69% success rate. For others, they do nothing.

I am also apparently co-morbid (according to the above term), and that is why for years the doctors moved between manic and clinical depression in trying to work out what was wrong with me. The symptoms didn't fit in what was expected. Manic surely, since we have the mood swings in such a way. But then there was far too little highs, so clinical depression became the talking point. When I last saw a psychiatrist, it was referred to as Severe Clinical Depression, which is apparently a banner title for about ten or so (maybe more) disorders they suspected I may have.

I can't claim for sure what I do have, since in 2008 I decided to stop seeing psychiatrists This is because on the whole I found them to be patronising, to belittle the patient, to in one case give out confidential details and other such niceties. One of my closest friends went to a psychiatrist in 2005 when his father died, and was told 'sod your dead father, you are a compulsive moaner with no redeemable attributes'. That is the general standard of psychiatry in Glasgow, at least. And with my trusted doctor retiring, this left the decision to try yet another psychiatrist, or leave it. I decided to leave it – I most probably will be back in the future. But all the trips were doing was making everything worse, to the point where it just didn't make sense any more.

So we know I suffer from severe depression, with heightened emotional instability, paranoia and hypochondria (the version in which the brain manages to force symptoms of illness, as opposed to the “Oh I think I have Ebola” type), and that I display the symptoms of two dissociative disorders, phobia, panic, anxiety, and a shockingly terrible episodic memory (which could mean anything, really).

Of course this does lead to interesting developments. Going to doctors, for example. I tend to hold off going to doctors for as long as possible, since I don't trust them. Previous trouble with them and previous family trouble with them led me to this empirical stance. Especially now, since my diagnosed problems are in my patient log, I frequently just get asked the question: “How can I be sure this isn't just in your mind?” Now, how do I answer that question? How can I be perfectly sure that the stabbing pains in my chest, and the closing up of my air passages was actual asthma? After all, my brain has been known to simulate asthma trouble at times, so why not one of the severe ones I get four times a year? It got so bad with Doctors, that Mandy has to come with me to see them. One, to actually get me to go see them, and two, to answer questions for me. That, and I can never remember anything that happened to me anyway.

I don't understand any of this, why I have things, why people react like that, whats going on. Any of it. I don't understand any of it, I just feel like a right idiot with no redeemable qualities. The city dunce.

Isn't that the mad thing about mental health? I give others advice, all the while thinking my advice is rubbish and being amazed if it actually works. You give me and others advice, and somedays you dont feel it...it's madness! (well, actually, it is in a way)

I actually had to look up Aspergers, because, whilst its a term I hear a lot, its not something I was very familiar with. Ironically, on looking up it, about half the signs of it are things you can spot with me! Mind you, one of my friends (who has Aspergers himself, along with Dyslexia and Dyspraxia) is convinced I have it or something like that.

I tend to err on my dad's note of caution though when it comes to myself, that "you can diagnose anyone with anything if you look hard enough." (Mind you, with his 20+ years of medical experience, he knows things, but doesn't really know how to deal with mental health all that well because they never taught any of that when he was studying, so he can only base his opinions on that from empirical experience.)

My favourite visit went something like this:

Doctor - Why are you here?
Me - I got sent by the hospital, because I've been diagnosed with clinical depression and they went my GP practice to send me to a pyschiatrist for evaluation.
Doctor - And what do you want me to do about that?

Thankfully I had my mum to hand to sort things out.

You know, I use to be afraid of my various problems, back when I was 16 and just assumed (without knowing anything to the contrary) that I was useless, when I used to keep having my dissociative moments (I still get them from time to time, though nowhere near as often).

There was a particularly scary time, which thankfully is mostly blocked (but not enough) out of my memory now (So very bad episodic memories can be good for some things) when I was seventeen and it was suspected that I may have schizophrenia. In no small part because of a spate of repeated hallucinations, delusions and the disorganised speech and thoughts problems. They decided soon after that I was probably not, but that time when it seemed like everyone was looking at me with a wee bit of fear in there eyes, that got to me more than anything.

Then again, none of that really went away. And I still talk to myself a great deal, internally as well, and have elongated conversations with my dead grandfathers for comfort. Mind you, I think everyone does that anyway!

Though I guess anyone who's read my responses on the Tenth Planet might have guessed I have disorganised thought at times! Heh.

The only things I fear nowadays is losing one of Mandy, my mum, my dad or Cat (my wee sister). I honestly don't know what I'd do without them.

Life is depressing, but it doesn't need to be.

Mind you, the most depressing thing about life I find is when you come up with some great idea that will help everyone out, and then some self-minded git says "That will adversely affect me, so none of you can do it - I've objected." And we're not talking cutting carbon emissions here, this is charity stuff or the like. Drives me nuts.

Mind you, my theorising behind everything stems to "Would it be good?" "Would it help other people?" "Is it moral?" then let's do it, and I can't honestly understand anyone who thinks an idea that works on those principles (eg, The Wellfare State) is a bad thing.

Though I do find keeping active helps wards the villains from the mind.

As far as I'm aware, I should be on medication, but I've honestly felt better in the year I've been off then than I did on them. Since I haven't seen a pyschiatrist since, I'm not that sure if they'd approve of those actions.

Don't laugh, but while I was on antidepressants, I found my creativity completly shot, and missed about five deadlines because I had nothing, I was just completly devoid of idea. Since going off the anti-ds, the depressions about the same mostly, but its like someones switched a tap back on my head.

Writing probably does help a lot, since I am so overwhelmingly consumed by the need to do it that it can put things off my mind for hours at a time. What's the saying again? I'm going to succeed at this or die trying ,and I have no intention of dying in the forseeable future.

Just remember, when it comes to feeling like a failure: the biggest failure in this country is the bank bosses who allowed the credit crisis to escalate, and even they have managed to earn enough money themselves to make themselves seem quite successful despite it. No man (or woman) is an island, and everybody benefits from the George Bailey effect.

Speaking of which, It's A Wonderful Life is just a great, great film. No other film in my life has had such a positive impact on me. It's the ultimate cheerer uppper for depression or anything. Which is ironic since the film itself is quite a dark one, but it gives the watcher a glance into a perspective rarely thought of, but one people need reminded of every now and again.

Talk is easier than most people believe it to be. I can talk to my mum or dad, but I don't like depressing my mother unless its strictly necessary, and my dad survived 20 years as a nurse by removing all emotional reaction: else he claims he'd have gone insane, with all the deaths during that time.

My major point of trouble was in 2002 - I think I mentioned that in my opening post. My membership of this forum currently reads January 2006, thanks to that embarrassing contratong I had with forum admin (only embarrassing on my part, I hasten to add) which led to a short enforced hiatus from the boards. However, before that my membership had been from November 2002.

Yes, part of my succesful recovery from my breakdown was joining Outpost Gallifrey! Because talking to people is easy. And talking helps.

Starting the thread was easy: since the worst that could happen would be everything would flame the OP, and myself as OP has very little sense of self-worth to make that any more detrimental than anything else. But if people talk, and they have and will talk, then people open up, and begin to feel better. Every person who talks in this thread, about themselves, or their friends, or their family, or each other, has the support of every other person, and others who read but do not reply.

I strongly believe that the world would be an infinitly better place if people talked about their lifes and problems and hopes and fears and all that, instead of bottling it all down. If this thread has helped anyone, any one soul at all, and just aided that hope by one tiny ammount, one speck less of fear in the world, one speck more of hope, than this will have done more of a job than could have been hoped for.